Sufi Women of South Asia

Women and Gender

the middle east and the islamic world

Editors

Susanne Dahlgren
Judith Tucker

Founding Editor

Margot Badran

volume 20

The titles published in this series are listed at brill.com/wg

Sufi Women
of South Asia
Veiled Friends of God

By

Tahera Aftab

LEIDEN | BOSTON
Cover illustration: Shrine of Saiyyida Khadīja Bībī, Kharadar, off Nishtar Road, Karachi.

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Contents

Preface ix
Acknowledgements xviii
List of Figures xx
Abbreviations xxii
Note on Transliterations xxiii

Introduction 1

Part 1
Sufis, Sufism, and Transformations

1 Setting the Scene 31

1.1 Evolution of the Muslim Community in South Asia 31
1.2 Arrival of Sufi Men in South Asia 38
1.3 Arrival of Sufi Women in South Asia 41
1.4 What Is Sufism? 44

2 The Sufi Texts: From Imagination to the Inscribed Word 52

2.1 The Genre of Hagiography 52
2.2 From the Spoken to the Written Word 54
2.3 The Sufi Malfūzāt 55
2.4 The Sufi Ṭabaqāt 59
2.5 The Spurious Malfūzāt 60
2.6 Writing Biographies of Sufi Women 62
2.7 Women in the Biographical Compendiums Written outside
South Asia 65
2.8 Women in the Sufi Sources and Biographical Compendiums of
South Asia 68
2.8.1 Kashfu’l Mahjūb and the Portrayal of Women 68
2.8.2 South Asian Malfūzāt and Tazkirāt and Sufi Women 70
2.8.3 Ḥaẓrat Amīr Khusraw: Poetic Imagery or a Patriarchal
Frame 80
2.9 Shrines: A Source for the Study of Sufi Women 83
vi Contents

3 The Sufi Gaze: Perception of Women by Male Sufis 88

3.1 Women as Chaos (Fitna) 90
3.2 Women as Deficient in Reasoning 94
3.3 Women as Personifying the Evil World 98

4 The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 104

4.1 Women as Mothers, Sisters, and Daughters 106
4.2 Women as Wives 112
4.3 Marital Life and Sex 120
4.4 Perception of Women by Seventeenth- and
Eighteenth-Century Sufis 126
4.5 Attitude towards Children 130
4.6 The Caring Sufis 134

5 The Sufi Gaze: Interaction with Maidservants and Women

of Ill Repute 136
5.1 Kanīz/kanīzak: Slave Girls and Maidservants 136
5.2 Women of Ill Repute 142

6 Women’s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 146

6.1 Women’s Initiation (Baiʿat) 147
6.2 Arguments against Women’s Presence in the Sufi Silsilas 159
6.3 Women as Sufis (Awliyāʾ Allāh) 162
6.4 Women as Khalīfas 165

7 Sufi Lodges: Fencing the Sacred and the Profane 173

7.1 The Khānqāh 173
7.2 Khānqāhs in South Asia 176
7.3 Women’s Khānqāhs 179
7.4 Women’s Presence in Sufi Lodges 180

8 Sufi Shrines: Manifesting the Deceased Sufi 185

8.1 Shrine Visitation by Women 190
8.2 Shrines as Spaces for Women’s Expression of Spirituality 191
8.3 Denouncement of Women’s Shrine Visitation 195
8.4 Barricading Women: Veiling and Segregation 198
Contents vii

Part 2
Biographies of Sufi Women

9 Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 205

9.1 Sufi Women of the Tenth Century 205
9.2 Sufi Women of the Twelfth Century 208
9.3 Sufi Women of the Thirteenth Century 215
9.4 Sufi Women of the Fourteenth Century 226
9.5 Sufi Women of the Fifteenth Century 253
9.6 Sufi Women of the Sixteenth Century 257
9.7 Sufi Women of the Seventeenth Century 276
9.8 Sufi Women of the Eighteenth Century 287
9.9 Sufi Women of the Nineteenth Century 299
9.10 Sufi Women of the Twentieth Century 301
9.11 Sufi Women of Unknown Time Period 304

10 Biographical Notices of Sufi Women according to Their

Specific Status 327
10.1 Sufi Women Khalīfas 327
10.2 Sufi Women’s Spiritual Sessions for Women Only 354
10.3 Women as Disciples of Their Fathers/Husbands/Sons/
Brothers 356
10.4 Sufi Women: Mothers of Sufi Men/Women 368
10.5 Sufi Women Recognised as Murshid by Their Husbands 400
10.6 Sufi Women Who Chose Not to Marry 404
10.7 Sufi Women Who Managed the Male Shrines 421
10.8 The Majzūb (Intoxicated) Sufi Women 423
10.9 Sufi Girl-Children 433
10.10 Sufi Women’s Khānqāh 436
10.11 Sufi Women Who Preferred Death to a Life of Dishonour 437
10.11.1 Observations of My Visit to the Shrine of Bībīāṅ
Pākdāmnāṅ 438
10.12 A Sufi Woman Who Wrote a Book of Instructions for
the Sufis 445
10.13 A Sufi Woman Who Wrote Sufi Biographies and about Her Own
Spiritual Journey 447
10.14 A Sufi Woman Who Led an Agitation and Revoked Her Baiʿat 453
viii Contents

11 Biographical Notices of Women Sufis Based on Oral Traditions

Collected by Visiting Their Shrines 456
11.1 Karachi 456
11.1.1 Female Shrines within the Dargāh of Haẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid
ʿAlī Datār 467
11.1.2 Healing Rituals at the Shrines 468
11.1.3 Legends about Mirāṅ Pīr 480
11.1.4 Māʾī Mirāṅ: Infertility Healer 482
11.1.5 ʿUrs Celebrations 486
11.1.6 Shrine: Space for Women’s Bonding 486
11.1.7 Shrine’s Management 487
11.2 Lahore 489
11.3 Multan 492

12 Sufi Women Identified by Name Only 495

12.1 Balochistan’s Forgotten Women Saints 495
12.2 Sufi Women of Ahmedabad, Gujarat, Whose Narratives
Are Lost 496
12.3 Women Sufis of Bengal and Bihar with Scanty Information 497
12.4 Women Sufis of Bijapur Whose Names Only Are Known 497
12.5 Women Sufis (Ḥaẓrāt ʿaurāt ʿārifā) Mentioned in a Hagiographical
Work by Shāh Muḥammad Ḥasan Ṣābirī-Chishtī Rampuri. 1311/1893.
Tawārīkh āin̄ a-yi taṣawwuf. Rampur: Ḥasani Press 498
12.5.1 Women Appointed as Khalīfas 498
12.5.2 Women Sufis (Ḥaẓrāt ʿaurāt ʿārifā) 498
12.5.3 Dar Zikr-i majāzīb (Plural of majzūb) (An Account of the
Intoxicated Ones), pp. 349–386 499

Conclusions 507

Glossary 511
Bibliography 514
Index 567
Preface

Academic studies of Sufis and Sufism, since the beginning of the twentieth
century, have acquired a growing popularity among scholars and readers. Most
of these studies have been limited to the accounts of male Sufis. Such studies,
in some instances, even view moral and ethical virtues—which are integral in
such narratives—in two separate blocks: as male and female virtues. Trapped
by this distorting notion, studies of Islam in general, and Sufism in particu-
lar, remain routinely limited to the accounts and attainments of male Sufis;
women remain, at best, an addendum. Women, whenever they appear in the
pages of such writings, are portrayed as appendages of the male Sufis, mostly
exemplifying male piety or projecting female wickedness; depictions of wom-
en’s characteristics of caring and nurturing are rare. In both these instances,
women, as a class, are annihilated. This book brings Sufi women of South Asia
to the centre of historical knowledge and restores their rightful status in the
growing and expanding literature on Sufism worldwide.
One of the major hurdles in the development of Muslim societies is under
recognition of women’s potential which results in underutilisation of women’s
agency, and often exploitation of their labour. The root cause of this underutili-
sation is the propagation of misogynist thoughts emerging from patriarchal
readings of the sacred texts of Islam, giving currency to myths about women
being troublemakers and deficient in intelligence. These misogynist interven-
tions in the realm of faith and tradition do not remain limited to sermons
delivered from the pulpits or religious discourses; they cross the borders of
social perceptions and behaviour. Thus, the dichotomic debate over women’s
assumed innate disability and deficiency persists, often slowing down wom-
en’s fair and just participation in community development.
The book that I present to my readers moves away from the traditional craft
of writing half-histories of Sufism in South Asia. Discarding this suppressive
methodology of writing history, Sufi Women of South Asia: Veiled Friends of
God presents Sufi women in their full human glory. The present work, thus,
is inspired by three goals: first, to search out and collate relevant references
found in the South Asian Sufi texts, including hagiographical accounts, about
Sufi women; second, to present specific narratives or references about mystic
women, and thus to salvage and secure these narratives with the purpose of
restoring women’s histories; and third, to explore women’s understanding of
taṣawwuf and the way they followed it. The last of these goals is the focal point
or the real inspiration of this book, and it runs through the entire text. This
x Preface

book, therefore, is not just an outcome of spending torturous hours mining

and extracting hidden treasures of Sufi women’s history, though that is much
warranted and even commendable; the book also argues that these salvaged
and retrieved narratives of pious women rightfully are part of mainstream
Sufi canon. The number of accounts of Sufi women that have been discovered
abundantly shows that the narratives of South Asian Sufis that do not include
women—or that include them merely as an addendum or as a ploy to glorify
Sufi men—merely presents half of history.
My conviction that righteous and virtuous women have existed always and
everywhere because all women, like all men, are the progeny of the first human
couple appointed by Allah as His khalīfa on Earth, led me to begin research for
this book with two hypotheses. The first is that women were and are central in
the history of the spread of taṣawwuf and also in Sufi praxis and discourses. My
second hypothesis is that, for some reason, this presence of women is either
purposely and consciously concealed or omitted. At the outset, I assured
myself that women’s stories should not be obliterated. I also believed that the
male-authored chronicles have kept such women veiled. I was also convinced
that exemplary women, like exemplary men, who are awliyāʾ Allah have always
existed and will continue to exist to guide fellow human beings in seeking the
Truth. My conviction emerges from my trust in the Word of Allah and my belief
that these friends of Allah, by virtue of their friendship with the Divine, the
only Reality without shape and form, are humans first and last.
These convictions worked as motivation through the past several years. In
searching for, selecting, and studying source material, both textual and oral, I
remained careful; as a student of history, the lesson I have learned is that while
some texts are written to project and preserve the truth, others are created to
erase the truth. Wilful omission, suppression of facts, and a selection of what
suits the scribe is similar to withholding testimony and consequently turns his-
tory into nothing less than perjury. I must admit that I am cognisant of the
inherent challenges that confront the writers of history, as all available sources
owe their existence first to selective writing, next to archiving, and then to ran-
dom indexing.
The present study, Sufi Women of South Asia: Veiled Friends of God, takes
the form of a historical overview and presents biographical notices of pious
and virtuous women from the early tenth century to contemporary times. Bio­
graphical notices are analytically integrated and synthesised with the major
and foundational Sufi texts, the malfūzāt and the tazkirāt. Recent works are
also included to examine the continuity of the earlier traditions that encour-
aged harbouring gender biases. This book is thus a rereading of the past. This
Preface xi

process of rereading gives new meanings to the older texts and suggests new
patterns of social behaviour and fresh modes of thinking.
This book, thus, entails the production of a new understanding of the preva-
lent gendered nature of religious behaviour and practices by reconstructing
the lives of pious women. This work primarily is a biographical compendium
of women who believed in and practiced asceticism and avoided its public
display. To prepare this book, I have drawn on multiple types of source mate-
rial, written as well as oral, including fieldwork observation which was done
primarily in Pakistan—Karachi, Thatta, Makli, Lahore, Multan, and Uchch.
Information was also collected with the help of email and WhatsApp. Interviews
with shrine managers, staff of the Auqaf Department (the Department that
looks after charitable endowments and bequests), religious scholars, and even
shopkeepers, taxi drivers, and passers-by in the vicinity of the shrines yielded
invaluable knowledge. Finally, this volume is not about women alone, to the
exclusion of men; indeed, it seeks to place women in a wider, more inclusive
social framework.
My focus throughout this study is not the ṭarīqa-based Sufism which
increasingly got trapped in highly ritualised performances in the garb of right
conduct (ādāb). A critical review of how Sufi theses of the different Sufi silsilas
swayed and guided the course of the cultural ethos of the South Asian Muslim
community, however, has remained a quintessential aspect of this study. Thus,
this book explores relationships between South Asian Sufism and the Muslim
community through the kaleidoscope of women’s lives. This volume, I hope,
would set in motion a fresh process of scrutinizing the texts and other records
in order to understand women’s experiences at all levels—mundane as well
as spiritual. This scrutinizing process anticipates raising specific questions.
Several epistemological questions that might not be considered directly con-
nected with the lives of Sufi women are legitimate questions of crucial signifi-
cance for a holistic understanding of women’s experiences. I expect that these
questions would lead to more questions, if not instant answers. One basic
question, which is of crucial significance, is regarding the false and erroneous
concept of women as the cause of the so-called fall of Adam from Heaven and
of the misconstrued deception by Eve of Adam. The second question is why
the interpretation of surah 4:34 of the Qurʾān as a verse about women’s subor-
dination is not re-examined as a distortion of the message of the Qurʾān and
how do these exegeses continue to relegate women into the private spaces?
Sadly, and shockingly, male Sufis not only approved these mistaken and mis-
leading interpretations but professed and propagated these fallacies. The third
question is regarding women’s mobility. Are restrictions on women’s mobility
xii Preface

legitimate? The texts, under review in this book, promoted a restricted view of
women by professing that virtuous women are women who remain concealed
and hidden. Is this view in accordance with the Qurʾān and the Traditions of
the Prophet?
I find myself compelled to add a personal note here concerning the popular
usage of the word Sufi. The traditional adāb of South Asian Muslims, which
nurtured my being and is reflected in all forms of conduct of the community,
expounds two distinctly opposite types of human temperaments (mizāj):
Sufiāna, simple, soft, humble, and subdued; and sauqyiāna, commonplace or
loud, almost vulgar. Thus, a Sufiāna mizāj person would eat moderately, con-
verse softly, and avoid flamboyant behaviour. On the contrary, a sauqyiāna
mizāj person would devour food noisily, with ostentatious manners. In short,
the Sufi way is embedded in the cultural ethos. This cultural ethos is created,
nurtured, and transmitted to generations after generations by women in their
families. Curiously, despite their negative views of women, male Sufis have also
paid homage to this role of women. To illustrate, let me share my personal
experience of the Sufi baraka in my life. The story goes back to before I was
born. The loss of her seven-day-old daughter, her first child, devastated and
traumatised my nineteen-year-old mother beyond any imagination. Emotion-
ally wrecked, she would sit cross-legged for months, between the ʿasr and the
maghrib prayers, hoping that the spirit of her daughter would visit her. As the
child had died without sucking a drop of breast milk, a rumour grew that it
was no ordinary being. A spell had overpowered the baby, it was said. Later,
to protect my mother, my paternal grandfather brought her a tʿāwīz (protec-
tion amulet) from the shrine of his pīr, Ḥaẓrat Miāṅ Mastān Shāh.1 Two years
later, when my mother was pregnant with me, she wished to have a daugh-
ter. To protect her pregnancy, my grandfather again sought the help from the
dargah. This time, a holy person arrived and literally punched four iron nails
into the four corners of our sprawled house, thus drawing a protective bound-
ary for the safe delivery. The nails were to be taken off on the fortieth day fol-
lowing the birth. All through the period of her pregnancy, my mother was not
to cross the sacred line of protection. On my fortieth day, I was taken to the
shrine of Bī Mayya, a mystic who is believed to have arrived in Rampur along
with the earliest migrants from Buner, Swat.2 For the next fourteen years of my

1 The shrine is in Kemri, Rampur (State), UP.

2 The shrine, or ziyārat, of Bī Mayya, is within the compound of a small but beautifully sublime
mosque in Mohalla Bazar Mullā Zarīf, my ancestral home in Rampur. Bī Mayya was a male
Sufi who always dressed as women do and wore glass bangles of the dhānī colour (green
shade of paddy or rice plants) and a headscarf of the same shade. As my grandfather used
to spend his nights praying in this mosque and used to serve the shrine (voluntarily) and
Preface xiii

life, on my birthday, a set of the finest green glass bangles and a headscarf of
green-coloured muslin, kept in a basket full of scented flowers, was offered in
thanksgiving as a nazrāna at the ziyārat. Women of the family were strongly
discouraged from visiting the shrine, though it was just across the road. The
feminine of the Divine, thus, through the intercession of Bī Mayya, remains
part of my existence, though Allah hath power over all things (surah 2:109).
In conclusion, I would like to share with my readers the history of the mak-
ing of this book. My interest in the study of women Sufis began a long time ago
when the late Professor Muhammad Mujeeb, whom sadly I could not meet
personally, suggested in his foreword to my book Women Mentors of Men that
to the list of women enjoying earthly power, I should also add women from
other classes as well. His observation that “Shaikh Nizamuddin’s mother, for
instance, would be a very instructive subject to discuss as she is one of many
whose lives are memorable”3 remained etched on my mind all through the last
several decades. I explored libraries and archives for books in South Asia and
elsewhere to identify works related to the lives of South Asian Muslim women.
I did find some, but if any reference to Sufi women was found, it was more
as a gesture of offering respect, praise, and adulation.4 Their histories, and
their contributions to the development and growth of discourse on spiritual-
ity, were missing. Since then, several studies dealing with women and spiri-
tuality have been published. While I offered several courses and seminars on
Women in Islam and Women and Religion and remained mentally engaged
with Sufism and the Sufis, I kept postponing my study of Sufi women. Once the
weight became almost unbearable, I began to shape my thoughts into words.
The present work, thus, while it lessens my burden, accumulated by neglecting
and postponing research that is close to my heart, attempts to erase or at least
minimise the neglect of the illustrious pious women. It also finally gives me the
opportunity to thank the late Professor Mujeeb.
The book aims to attract readers from varied backgrounds and affiliations—
scholars of Islam in all geographies, students of comparative religions, feminist
scholars, scholars of women’s history, and of course all those who are travel-
lers on the path of knowledge. At the risk of sounding vain, this biographi-
cal compendium of South Asian pious women is unique in its contents and

recited the Qurʾān by its side, therefore when he passed away at the age of one hundred and
four years, he was rewarded an exceptional honour. Though his last resting place was already
there in the ancestral burial ground, at the insistence of those who offered prayers at this
mosque he is laid to rest next to Bī Mayya.
3 Tahera Azmat. 1970. Women Mentors of Men. Ujjain: Siddhartha Prakashan.
4 See Introduction in my book, Inscribing South Asian Muslim Women: An Annotated
Bibliography & Research Guide. (Leiden: Brill, 2008.) where I have highlighted these issues.
xiv Preface

presentation. This book, in essence and in form, is the long-awaited, modern-

day tazkira of awliyāʾ Allah. I feel honoured to present stories of women awliyāʾ
from South Asia for the first time for wider global readership.

The Structure of the Book

This preface introduces the book Sufi Women of South Asia: Veiled Friends of
God, which indeed is unique and the first of its kind in terms of the number
of biographies of Sufi women and their shrines. The book covers the vast geo-
graphical expanse of South Asia from the eleventh century to the early twen-
tieth century.
The introduction sets the scene with a brief overview of the recurrent theme
of the book, unveiling the presence of Sufi women. It identifies the key factors
that shaped women’s lives at the nascent stage of the growth of the Muslim
community in Hindustan and continued to play the most significant role in
gender equation within the society. Review of selected recent scholarly works
and modern research studies relevant to my work is offered. Next, I have added
a note on research methods and process adopted for the completion of this
book.
The main body of my study is divided into two parts; each set offers a nar-
rative which, though different in themes examined and discussed, is threaded
with the other. Part 1 consists of eight chapters. Chapter 1, which sets the scene,
has four subheads. The first part of this chapter presents an assessment of the
evolution of the Muslim society in South Asia, with a brief but critical assess-
ment of women’s presence in the emerging Muslim community of South Asia.
Allied to this theme, the book looks next at the arrival of the Sufis, both male
and female, under separate subheads. This overview is followed by a brief study
of Sufism, its meanings and concepts, as explained and taught by the early Sufi
Shaikhs in South Asia. With an analytical approach, this chapter examines two
terms: Sufism and taṣawwuf, which are the two most familiar terms in studies
on Islamic mysticism. With reference to the expositions of the two terms by
celebrated Sufi Shaikhs, this chapter shows that while Sufism puts emphasis
on the Sufi ṭarīqas with their Shaikh-created rules, taṣawwuf exists without any
hierarchical control over other human beings. It is simply obedience to the
Divine. These three themes set the scene for the development, growth, and
maturation of ideas and concepts, and for the interplay of power and authority
within the spiritual and profane spaces.
Chapter 2, which is divided into nine subheads, presents an assessment of
Sufi sources. This chapter examines, with reference to selected texts and their
Preface xv

authors, how the concept of men in authority and women in obedience was
codified in the Sufi canons. The first category of these texts emerged from the
spoken word of a Sufi Shaikh. The spoken words were recorded on paper by a
scribe, recalling what was said earlier. These spoken words soon transformed
themselves into solid works of manuals on ethics, morality, and spiritual-
ity. This chapter examines how and under what forces the direction of gen-
der dynamics of the emerging South Asian Muslim society were shaped and
formed. These gender dynamics have not changed much over the centuries
and continue to remain in effect even today. An appraisal of major trendset-
ters in establishing conservative gender norms is also included here and linked
with the absence or scarcity of women’s visibility in the Sufi canon. Finally, a
brief appraisal of shrines as sources for the identification of Sufi women who
are omitted or not found in the texts is added. The importance of shrines, both
as a source for compiling Sufi women’s biographies and as sacred spaces for the
expression of their spirituality, is highlighted.
Next, I present an assessment of how all women are viewed through the male
Sufi’s gaze—as inherently feeble in intellect and innately trouble-causing, and
who can only be tolerated at the lower levels of social, political, and religious
hierarchies. Women as the cause of Adam’s Fall from Heaven, women as fitna,
as an embodiment of evil and as devoid of reasoning, intellect, and proper
understanding of faith is critically evaluated in this chapter.
Next is an analysis of male Sufis’ perception of their family responsibili-
ties, the women of their families, their attitude towards married life and sex,
and care of their children. Chapter 5 is an appraisal of a much-neglected issue
related to fallen women and women-slaves and maidservants. Women’s initia-
tion, or taking an oath of allegiance into the Sufi order, is examined in chapter
6. Chapter 7 presents a brief overview of Sufi abodes, lodges, and khānqāhs
which emerged as icons of spiritual authority, separating the sacred from the
profane, and raising structures that stood next to mosques but often attracted
larger attendees. This chapter concludes by looking at women’s lodges or
khānqāhs and their presence at the male Sufi khānqāhs. Chapter 8 examines
controversies about shrine visitation. This chapter symptomizes the everlast-
ing glory of Sufi darbārs and ziyārats which sanctify the landscape of South
Asian Islam, and it examines women’s presence at shrines and studies the con-
tinuous debate over shrine visitation, particularly by women as an irreligious
act. Throughout my analysis of the primary sources, I have been watchful in
reading the texts by visualising the producers of these discourses, the scribe of
the texts and their first audiences, in the context of gender dynamics and the
cultural-social ethos of the period of their production.
xvi Preface

Part 2 of the work, the essence of this research, shows how women, over-
riding male power structures of authority created and sustained by rituals,
negotiated with the male paradigms of spirituality and connected with the
Divine. Thus, applying their self-agency, these women silently created a space
for themselves where they sought the Divine, away from public gaze and male
scrutiny. Here, divided into several chapters, I have presented 134 biographi-
cal notices of Sufi women. Chapter 9 consists of 83 notices, 63 of which are
from the tenth century to the early twentieth century and an additional 20
for which the dates are not known or confirmed. Chapter 10 includes notices
of 83 Sufi women according to their specific status: nine Sufi women Khalīfas;
one Sufi woman who held spiritual sessions for women; five Sufi women who
performed baiʿat at the hands of their Sufi fathers/husbands/sons/brothers;
nine notices of Sufi women who are mothers of Sufi men and women; one Sufi
woman who was recognised as Murshid by her husband; narratives of three
Sufi women who did not marry; exceptional case studies of two Sufi women
who performed duties as managers of male Sufis’ shrines; nine stories of intox-
icated Sufi women; three young girls who were endowed with the charismatic
powers of an excellent Sufi; one Sufi woman who is known to have a khānqah;
stories of two women who preferred death to a life of dishonour; a Pashtun Sufi
woman who wrote a book of instructions for Sufi men; the narrative of a Sufi
woman who wrote the only Sufi tazkira and her autobiographical experiences
of becoming a devout Sufi; and finally the amazing story of a sixteenth-century
Sufi woman who revoked her pledge, led an agitation movement amongst the
male Sufis, and finally earned success in her mission.
Chapter 11 presents biographical narratives of seventeen Sufi women based
on oral traditions and through the studies of their shrines. This study draws
upon my several visits to women’s shrines in Karachi, Multan, and Lahore. The
most fascinating aspect of this chapter is the real presence of women within
the spiritual environs of today.
Lastly, in chapter 12 a list of names of thirty-two Sufi women from differ-
ent regions of South Asia is added, with no major details. These names are
extracted from texts, including one manuscript. Also included, extracted from
Tawārīkh āʾīna-yi taṣawwuf, an 1893 hagiography of the Ṣābirī silsila, is a list of
107 Sufi women, along with their dates of birth and death, places of their birth
and death, and location of their shrines, along with their hierarchical/spiritual
status. I must point out that in addition to the biographical notices this book
presents, there are many more scattered and hidden in vernacular texts and
in local legends, waiting to be redeemed from obscurity. I must also say that
this last subchapter, though it offers sparse information and consists mostly of
names only, still carries great significance. I interpret this scanty information
Preface xvii

as historic evidence of the presence of more Sufi women in more areas of

South Asia. The usual practice is to present such information in the form of an
appendix. I have opted not to relegate these entries to an appendix. I believe
that sketchy narratives and accounts of life stories of Sufi women are not a
criterion for their allocation to an appendix; indeed, they reflect more on the
nature and method of historiography in general, and the writing of women’s
history in particular, and far less on the merit of these women of piety.
All entries are in alphabetical order by giving the name of the Sufi woman as
it appears in the primary texts, inscriptions, oral traditions, and other sources
that I have accessed. I have given dates of birth, death, and ʿurs (celebration
of death anniversary at the shrines), if available. Biographical notices vary in
length, depending on the availability of information.
A brief conclusion brings the book to its end. To help the readers have a
smooth and comfortable reading of the book, I have also added a glossary of
words and terms in Persian, Urdu, and other local languages.
Acknowledgements

I would not have thought of writing this book had the late Professor
Muhammad Mujeeb not suggested to me to study the life of Bībī Zulaikha,
the mother of Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ. Though I began reading about
this pious woman, I kept postponing my writing. Finally, I decided that it was
time to finish writing this book and thereby honour the memory of Professor
Muhammad Mujeeb.
Through the long years working on this book, I have received inspiration
from a number of people and events. I am deeply grateful to friends, scholars,
and students who have inspired me and assisted me in various ways to under-
take this study. Dr. Khanday Pervaiz Ahmad of the Maulana Azad National
Urdu University, Hyderabad (India), helped me by sending me the most recent
images of the shrine of Bībī Zulaikha from Delhi. Though I had visited this
shrine several times in the past, these photographs transported me virtually
to the shrine complex. I am indebted to Dr. Pervaiz Ahmad. Kaleem Chughtai
and the late Dr. Ansar Zahid Khan of the Pakistan Historical Society were of
great help in identifying some sources and providing me with photocopies of
some of these works. My two research assistants, Huma Afaque and Tanazza
Sakha, helped me at every stage of this research. I would like to thank them
for their valuable assistance over the period of one year. I also thank Dr. Saud
Rohilla of Lahore who made photocopies of the two manuscripts, Akbāru’l
awliyāʾ min lisānu’l aṣfiyāʾ and Maʿāriju’l wilāyat, for me. I remain highly grate-
ful to him. Sarifah Abdullah, Senior Deputy Chief Librarian, Dar Al-Hikmah
Library, International Islamic University Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, was so quick
in helping me that within no time she emailed me a copy of al-ʿunwān fi sulūk
an niswān of ʿAlī Muttaqī alʿunwān fi sulūk an niswān. I am highly grateful to
her. In Karachi, the library of Anjuman Taraqqi-ye Urdu Pakistan, a treasure
house for researchers, helped me tremendously. I pay my deep respects to the
memory of Maulawī ʿAbdul Ḥaqq Ṣāḥib for the legacy he has left behind for
us. Professor Masud Anwar Alavi of the Department of Arabic, Aligarh Muslim
University was very kind in sending me some material on the Sufis of Kākorī.
I am also greatly indebted to the Higher Education Commission of Paki-
stan for its generous grant for a period of twelve months in 2015. Historical
investigation and interrogation coupled with ethnographic observations
was made possible by this grant. Earlier, in 2002–2003, Gettysburg College,
in Pennsylvania (USA), funded a small project titled “Women and Religious
Authority in Pakistan.” Fieldwork was completed in Karachi with the help of
this grant. An exhibition of photographs of women’s shrine visitation, taken
Acknowledgements xix

during this research, was mounted in March–May 2003 at Gettysburg College.

In 2004–2006, a research project, Women’s Experience of Reproductive Health in
Pakistan and Indonesia, and Canada: A Comparative Life Story Project, a collab-
orative team research between Universitas Indonesia, University of Karachi,
and Memorial University, Canada, and funded by IDRC, Canada, led me to visit
shrines in Karachi and Lahore, where women devotees sought blessings for
healing their health. During these visits, I listened to the stories about women
of all ages and social backgrounds, suffering from physical ailments, emotional
distress, and physical abuse, who came to seek the blessings of the saints bur-
ied in the shrines. I watched rich women, particularly in Lahore, dropping their
gold ornaments through the slits of padlocked green boxes kept for collect-
ing nazrāna (offerings), and poor women making an offering of small coins or
even a home-raised chicken to the shrine keeper, as an oblation, in Thatta. All
these women, whether they talked to me or remained silent, have added tre-
mendously to my understanding of life around and inside the shrines. I owe my
gratitude to them. Over the long years of my active teaching career, countless
young men and women in Pakistan, and at campuses outside Pakistan, helped
me in keeping my academic pursuits agile. My indebtedness to them remains
unbounded. Finally, I would like to thank Nicolette van der Hoek, Acquisitions
Editor Middle East and Islamic Studies and Nienke Brienen-Moolenaar for
their professional assistance throughout the whole publication process. I have
no words to thank my children and grandchildren. It is because of them that I
enjoy the bliss of motherhood and they continuously inspire me to make my
life meaningful.
Figures

All photos made by the author, except numbers 17, 18, 19, 21, 22, 23, 26, and 30 made by
my two research assistants, Huma Afaque and Tanazza Sakha

1 Women devotees at the Dātā Darbār, Lahore 94

2 Shrine of Bībī Jawindī, Uchch Sharīf 242
3 Back view of the shrine of Bībī Jawindī Uchch Sharīf 243
4 Metal board posted by the Department of Archaeology, Government of
Pakistan, provides a brief note in the Urdu language introducing the visitors to
Bībī Jawindī, Uchch Sharīf 243
5 Shrine of Bībī Fāṭima Saiyyida Gilānī, 1 Link Road, Lahore 260
6 Shrine of Harro Bībī, Mcleod Road, Lahore 264
7 Wall inscription in Urdu declaring that Harro Bībī was a disciple of Shaikh
Mūsā Āhangar (d. 925/1519) 265
8 Shrine of Shāh Parioṅ jo Āsitāna (Shrine of the King Fairies), Makli, Thatta. The
chicken brought as a gift is roaming around in the background 317
9 A woman devotee is presenting her infant for treatment to the spiritual healer,
Shāh Parioṅ 318
10 A devotee holding a piece of salt to lick for spiritual healing at the shrine of
Shāh Parioṅ, Makli, Thatta 318
11 Shrine Bībī Rāstī also known as Pāk Mā’ī and as Pāk Dāmnāṅ, Multan 385
12 Ancestral history of Bībī Rāstī, Multan 386
13 Front view of Bībī Rāstī shrine, Multan 388
14 Another front view of Bībī Rāstī shrine, Multan 388
15 Women’s graves at the shrine of Bībī Rāstī, Multan 390
16 An anonymous woman’s grave in the courtyard of Bībī Rāstī shrine,
Multan 390
17 Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ Gaŕhī Shāhū, Lahore 440
18 Motichoor laddūs (a popular ball-shaped sweetmeat) with a ring affixed to its
top, Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ, Gaŕhī Shāhū, Lahore 440
19 Amma Khairu’n-nisāʾ, Mewa Shāh Graveyard, Karachi 457
20 Outside Amma Bībī Maryam shrine, Near Keamari Post Office, Karachi 458
21 Amma Bībī Maryam shrine, Near Keamari Post Office, Karachi 459
22 Chilla of Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār, Karachi 463
23 Shrine visitor receiving blessings at the shrine of Rāstī Mā, located within the
Chilla of Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār Karachi 464
Figures xxi

24 A devotee woman putting oil from the earthen lamp on her tongue at the Chilla
of Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār Karachi 465
25 A woman oiling hair of a child as a cure at the Chilla of Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid
ʿAlī Datār Karachi 466
26 Women visitors waiting to enter the Chilla of Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār
Karachi 467
27 Shrine of Bībī Umm-i Ḥabība, Kharadar, off Nishtar Road, Karachi 471
28 Shrine of Saiyyida Khadīja Bībī, Kharadar, off Nishtar Road, Karachi 473
29 A woman healer at the shrine of Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh/Sayyida Junaid Bībī/Mirāṅ
Pīr Lea Market, Karachi 479
30 Khalīfas (representatives), appointed by the Sindh Government to look after
the shrine of Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh, Karachi 479
31 Women visitors resting at the shrine of Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh, Karachi 480
32 Shrine of Haẓrat Shah ʿAbdu’l Mannān Ḥuẓūrī alma῾ārūʿf Burqa῾posh, Hall
Road, Lahore 491
33 Chādarwāli Sarkār shrine, Hasan Parwana Colony, Multan. The shrine of Amma
Bī, his wife, is inside this shrine complex 492
Abbreviations

AA Akhbāru’l Akhyār by Shaikh ʿAbu’l-Ḥaqq Muḥaddis Dihlawi

FF Fawa‌ʾidu’l fuʾād of Hasan Sijzi
Hujwīrī Kashfu’l Mahjūb (nuskhā-ye Samarqand)
Jamālī Siyaru’l ʿArifīn of Jamali Kambo Dihlawi
KM Khairu’l Majālis of Ḥamīd Qalandar
Nicholson English translation of the Kashf al-Mahjūb by R.A. Nicholson
NU Kitāb Nafahātu’l Uns of ʿAbdu’r Raḥmān Jāmī
SA Siyaru’l Awliyāʾ
Note on Transliterations

All translations in the book are my own, unless otherwise indicated. Dates in
the text are given according to the Common Era date. Hijri dates followed by a
slash precede the Common Era dates.
All titles of works cited, non-English words and phrases, and transcribed
words in the text appear in italics. In my transliteration, I have adhered to the
South Asian usage of the spoken and written Persian and Urdu words. I have
not italicised or transliterated words, such as Sufi. For example, I use Ḥaẓrat
and not Ḥaḍrat, zikr and not Dhikr; similarly, in this text it is bidʿat and not
bidʿa, and baiʿat and not baiʿah. However, I have retained the spelling of Ḥadīth.
Brackets [ ] are used to indicate this author’s additions not found in the orig-
inal text.
Note: Passages from the Qurʾān are identified by chapter and verse in the
brackets within the text. Translations of the Qurʾānic verses are cited from
Abdullah Yusuf Ali’s interpretation, unless otherwise specified.
‫ �ظ‬z
�‫ب‬ b Urdu Vowels
�‫ت‬
‫ع‬ �‫چ‬
t ʿ ch
�‫ث‬ ‫�غ‬ ‫ٹ‬
s gh � t́
‫ف‬ ‫ �ڈ‬d́
�‫ج‬
j �� f
‫ق‬ ‫�ڑ‬
‫ح‬ �
ḥ
‫ خ‬kh
q ŕ
� ‫ك‬ k ‫ں‬ ṅ
‫ د‬d
‫�ذ‬ ‫ل‬ l
z
‫نم‬
m
‫ر‬
�
r
‫�ز‬ n
‫�ه‬
z
‫��س‬
h
s
��‫�ش‬ sh ‫و‬ w
‫ء‬
‫�ص‬
ʿ
ṣ
�
‫�ض‬ ẓ �‫�ي‬ y

‫ط‬ ṭ
xxiv Note on Transliterations

For diacritical marks and Romanized versions, I have used the following
dictionaries:

A Dictionary of Urdū Classical Hindī and English, by John Platts. Delhi: Munshiram
Manoharlal (1993).
A Comprehensive Persian-English Dictionary, by F. Steingass. Lahore: Sange-e-Meel
Publications (2000).
Introduction

Sulṭān Raẓiya was a great sovereign (bādshāh-i buzurg), sagacious

(ʿāqil), just (ʿādil), benevolent (karīm), patron of the learned (ʿālim
nawāz), dispenser of justice (ʿadl gustār), the cherisher of her sub-
jects (rʿaīyat parwar) and commander of the armies (lashkar kash).
Thus, she was endowed with all the admirable attributes and quali-
fications necessary for a king. But from the point of her birth, she
was not counted among men.1

...
Had it been permitted to give the authorization for succession [of
the Sufi shaikh] and the permission to sit on the rug of prayer [seat
of the Shaikh] to a woman, I would have given it to Bībī Sharīfa.2

⸪
Raẓiya Sulṭān, the subject of the first extract above, was the first woman to rule
over the nascent Delhi Sultanate from 1236 to 1240 while the Muslim commu-
nity of South Asia was passing through its formative stage of evolution. This is
a powerful testimony of a woman ruler’s capacity to lead and rule a state that
emerged through the celebrated enterprise of male empire builders. It also
reflects how deeply gender conflicts were set in the male psyche of the elite
and educated segment of society. The quote is from the contemporary Farsi
text on the history of the Sultanate by a male historian, Minhāj Sirāj Juzjāni.
Raẓiya’s rule came to an abrupt end with her murder preceded by insurgency
among her male courtiers.

1 The Tabaqaāt-i Nāsiri of Aboo ʿOmar Mināj al-dīn ʿOthman Ibn Sirāj-al-dīn -al-Jawzjāni. Edited
by Captain W. Nassau Lees and Mawlawis Khadim Hosain and ʿAbd-al Ha‌ʾi. Calcutta: College
Press (1864). Minhāj Sirāj Juzjāni, William Nassau Lees, Khādim Ḥosain, and Abd al-Hai.
1864. p. 185. (Translated by the author from the Persian text); For Urdu translation, see Minhāj
Sirāj Juzjāni, and Ghulām Rasūl Mahr. 1985. Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī. Jild awwal. Lahore: Urdu Science
Board, pp. 806–7.
2 Bābā Farīd’s saying about her daughter, Bībī Sharīfa, vide Amīr Khwurd, Sayyid Muḥammad
Mubārak al-ʿAlawi al-Kirmānī. 1302/1885. Siyaru’l Awliyāʾ dar aḥwāl wa malfūzāt-i mashāʾikh-i
Chisht. Dihlī: Maṭbaʿ Muḥibb-i-Hind, p. 191. (Hence forward, referred to as SA).

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_002

2 Introduction

The second quotation above is a saying attributed to Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn

Ganj-i Shakkar (1175–1265), one of the most revered Sufis of the Chishtī order
of South Asia. Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn, also known as Bābā Farīd, knew that his
daughter, Bībī Sharīfa, possessed all the virtues of a Sufi and was superbly
qualified to succeed him as the head of his Sufi order at Ajodhan, Punjab.
However, under the weight of misogyny, the revered Sufi—the fountainhead
of the Chishtī order of India and well versed in the canons of Islam—chose
against conferring spiritual succession to his daughter. Her gender, as in the
case of Raẓiya, deprived her of what she deserved. The elite men in positions
of authority, power, and influence—irrespective of the nature of the power
they commanded, ranging from pen and sword to crown and cloak—put their
massive weight against women of substance with leadership potential. Thus,
scholars, Sufis, and the political elite, setting aside their dislike for each other,
were unified in their tactics of keeping women under subjugation. Rejection of
women as independent and autonomous beings in roles of leadership, both in
the worldly as well as the spiritual realms, gained acceptance with this group.
Another example of this rejection comes from the pen of Amīr Khusraw
(1253–1325), a poet, mystic, and courtier—a middleman between the two
centres of power—the court of the Sultan and the hospice of the Sufi. Amīr
Khusraw’s long and affectionate association with Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ
Chishtī (d. 1325) gives his words more significance in the context of this study.
Khusraw viewed virtuous women as those women who remain within their
houses, concealed behind several curtains, to the extent of not even peeping
out to look at the world outside. These hidden women, in Khusraw’s view, thus
had few and scarce opportunities to enter the mainstream of the Sufi institu-
tions. This theme is further explored in the next sections of this work.
The notion of virtuous women being always veiled and confined to house-
hold chores became over time an essential and well-protected central element
of Muslim society. Almost a century later, following the tragic murder of Raẓiya
Sulṭān in 1240, ʿIṣāmī (1311?), in his versified history, Futūḥ-us Salaṭīn (Victories
of the Sultans), which he also named as Shāh nāma-ye Hind (completed in
1350), denounces Raẓiya Sulṭān for discarding the veil, saying that with the
removal of the veil her shame (ḥayāʾ) was gone and was replaced by shokhī
(impudence). He further argues that jahān-dārī (ruling over a state) is not a
woman’s work. As a woman inherently lacks intelligence (kih dar aṣl nāqiṣ
shud ast ʿaql-i o), therefore the best task for a good woman, ʿIṣāmī declares, is
to work constantly with a spinning wheel (charghā sāzad mudām).3 Historical
facts, however, prove that he and the others who concurred with this misogy-
nistic view were blatantly wrong.

3 ʿIṣāmī, Abdul Malik. 1948. Futūḥ-us-Salaṭīn. Ed. by A.S. Usha. Madras: Madras University,
pp. 133–34.
Introduction 3

Contrary to the rigid perception of women by the elite, the attitudes of the
common people, the populace, were more fair and accommodative. Raẓiya was
the first ruler to ascend with a public mandate. Discarding Sulṭān Iltutmish’s
will declaring Raẓiya as his successor, the elite instead replaced her with the
Sulṭān’s son, Ruknu’d-Dīn, who immediately made plans to kill her. Raẓiya,
however, in order to reverse the tide of events in her favour, dressed in red—
the garment of the oppressed—and successfully appealed to the annās (the
common people, including the soldiers), to the chagrin of the court elite.
The whole pageantry of this public display of her power to win the hearts
of the common men is produced below in the words of ibn Baṭuṭa:

One Friday, after Rukn-ud-dīn had gone to attend the prayer, Raẓiyā
ascended the roof of the daulat khāna, the old palace, which lay in the
vicinity of the great congregational mosque; and she had then put on the
garment of the oppressed. She presented herself to the army (an-nās)
and addressed them from the roof saying,
“My brother killed his brother and he now wants to kill me.” Saying this
she reminded them of her father’s time and of his good deeds and benevo-
lence to the people. This led to a revolt and they proceeded against Sulṭān
Rukn-ud-din at the time when he was in the mosque. He was arrested
and taken to her. She said that the murderer should be killed; and he was
killed in retaliation for his brother’s death. Their brother Nāṣir-ud-dīn
was a stripling. The army [an-nās] agreed to appoint Raẓiyā as ruler.4

Eventually, the Turkish court nobles rebelled against Raẓiya Sulṭān, deposed
and imprisoned her. Her final bid to fight the male hegemony failed and while
fleeing from the battlefield, she along with her husband was later killed in 1240.
Thus, Raẓiya Sulṭān’s short-lived rise to power and her final and tragic rejection
by the crafty males in authority, and Bībī Sharīfa’s total rejection by her pious
father who rules the realm of heart even today, are two episodes that serve as a
prelude to the rest of the saga of South Asian Muslim women. The reasons for
women’s deprivation, as given in these two episodes, expose and confirm male
perception that women’s position and status in society depends upon male
approval, patronage, and authorisation. These two narratives indeed illustrate
that power and authority are viewed as male prerogatives; men, depending
upon their choices, can either delegate power to women or withhold it from
them. Within this gendered view of the endorsement of sociopolitical and

4 Agha Mahdi Husain (Ed. and trans.)1976. The Reḥla of ibn Baṭuṭa (India, Maldives Islands and
Ceylon). Baroda: Oriental Institute, p. 34.
4 Introduction

religious authority, the newly arrived Muslim community in South Asia strug-
gled to build its identity wearing the label of Islam.
As an end result, at each stage of its growth and expansion, the dichotomy
between the tenets of the Islamic faith and the community’s professed pat-
tern of behaviour continued to expand and get deeper. These dichotomies are
reflected by Abul ʿAlā Maudūdi (1903–1979), the founder of the widespread
political-religious party Jamāʿat-i Islāmī (with its headquarters in Pakistan
and local chapters in India, Bangladesh, and England and supporters spread
over even vast and expanding geographies), in his comment proclaiming veil-
ing as a virtue to be strictly implemented in Muslim societies. In his widely
read 1940 book Parda: sharaʿī aur ijtimāʿī nuqta ye nigāh se (Parda: From the
Religious and Social Perspectives), he pronounced, “Though the veil has not
been specified in the Qurʾān, it is Qurʾānic in spirit.”5 The translator of this book
from Urdu into English, which was avowedly done to attract a larger reader-
ship, observed that “this book, more than any other has in recent years helped
people to understand clearly the nature of the correct relationship between
man and woman in the social life, and appreciate the great design that Nature
wills to fulfil through them on the earth.” His comment moved the debate
beyond veiling to larger issues of the whole world.6 Strict enforcement of veil-
ing, though admittedly not approved by the Qurʾān, moved further ahead, to
the extent of equating it with unpardonable sin to be penalised by punishment
of death. Thus, a scholar from Karachi, Mufti Rashīd Aḥmad, in a small Urdu
tract, equates women’s unveiling or improper veiling with an open act of sin
(ʿilāniyā gunāh) and a declared rebellion (khulī baghāwat). He then proclaims
that death is the punishment for all acts of rebellion.7
The second accusation against women that we referred to at the beginning
of this introduction was related to women’s lack of intelligence and wisdom,
consequently restricting and preventing their leadership role in matters of
faith, religion, and the state. The idea that women are deprived of intelligence,
too, remains lodged in the psyche of male members of the Muslim community.
Thus, when Farhat Naseem Hashmi, a PhD and an academic, began lecturing
to women on religious themes, first in Pakistan and later in other countries

5 Abul ʿĀlā Maudūdi. 1972. Parda: Sharaʿī aur ijtimāʿi nuqta ye nigāh se [Pardah: From the
Religious and Social Perspective] Pathankot: Maktabā jamāʿat Islāmī. Also, Pardah and
the Status of Women in Islam. Translated and edited by al-Ashʿarī (1972). Lahore: Islamic
Publications, p. 127.
6 Ibid, p. 2.
7 Muftī Rashīd Aḥmad. 2000. Sharaʿī parde par Qurʾānī aḥkām ki mudallal aur sairr ḥāṣil tafṣīl
[Well-reasoned discussion of Qurʾānic injunctions on the legal status of Islamic veiling]
Karachi: al-Rashid, p. 53.
Introduction 5

through her organisation called al-Huda International (founded in 1994),

attempts were made to silence her by accusing her of lack of knowledge about
Islam and for spreading “westernisation.”8

1 Recent Scholarly Works on Sufi Women, Spirituality,

and Shrine Visitation

The heading alone sounds far too ambitious and broad for a brief appraisal.
Indeed, the list of books that informed my understanding and enriched my
knowledge of the above three themes is huge; I have a never-ending gratitude
for them. A majority of these texts focus on Sufi women of regions beyond
South Asia.
Though I could not find any one single volume offering life stories of Sufi
women of South Asia, along with an appraisal of male Sufis’ attitude toward
women and gender, the books that helped me in directing my search to the
right channel are numerous. With my sincere apologies to authors not included
in the following survey (but some do appear, at relevant places, in the text), a
brief survey of some selected works is presented below.
Although research and production of books on the lives and contribu-
tion of Sufi women of South Asia remained neglected, women researchers
were not oblivious to this sad void. Schimmel in 1975, more than forty years
back, pointed to an omission of Sufi women of South Asia in research and
writing. She observed, “Names of women saints are found throughout the
world of Islam, though only few of them have been entered into the official
annals … but the area in which women saints flourished most is probably
Muslim India.”9 After a gap of two decades, Netty Bonuvrié in 1995, probably
inspired by Schimmel’s above-cited observation, begins her article by placing
Schimmel’s quote at the very beginning. Drawing scholars’ attention to the
continuous lack of research, Bonuvrié states, “Although the last decades have
witnessed an increase of studies about Sufism on the Indian subcontinent,

8 Maulānā Muftī Muḥammad Ismāʿīl Ṭūr. 2001. al-Hudā internashnul kiyā Hai? [What is al-
Huda International?] Karachi: al-maktaba al-Binnoriya; Maulanā Muftī Muṭʿiʾur Raḥmān.
2002. Hidāyat yā gumrāhī? Al-Hudā internashnul Qur’an wo Ḥadīth kī roshnī main [Guidance
or Misguidance: al-Huda International in the Light of the Qur’an and Ḥadīth] Karachi:
al-maktaba al-Binnoria; Khanum Shaikh. 2010. ‘New expressions of religiosity; Al-Huda
International and the Expansion of Islamic Education for Pakistani Muslim Women’
(pp. 163–184), in Zayn R. Kassam (Ed.) Women and Islam. Santa Barbara: Calif.: Praeger.
9 Annemarie Schimmel. 1975. Mystical Dimensions of Islam. Chapel Hill: North Carolina Press,
p. 433.
6 Introduction

there is hardly any study about female Sufi saints of this area.”10 This neglect
or omission led Laury Silvers to make another observation, though not in the
context of South Asian Sufi women but aptly and equally applicable to the
case of South Asia. She writes that “the sheer number of extant reports of men
compared to women in the formative literature means that women are read as
marginal to the development, transmission, and preservation of Sufi practices,
knowledge, and teaching.”11
Much did not occur to fill this gap. However, the emerging emphasis on
“the virtuous and the good Muslim woman” produced a plethora of writings
in Urdu, few original, most plagiarised, and some translations from Persian
or Arabic, while some are more like sermons by male religious authorities
on good women’s ādāb (etiquette), and not as texts on matters pertaining to
religion and faith. Narratives about Sufi women that have begun to come out
recently appear as popular reads.12
To understand women’s position in the Sufi texts, familiarity with the sta-
tus of women and gender as given in the Qurʾān is quintessential. I found two
books of significant relevance to this subject. The first is Amīna Wadud’s study
Qur’an and Woman: Rereading the Sacred Text from a Woman’s Perspective;13
the second is Asma Barlas’s Believing Women in Islam: Unreading Patriarchal
Interpretations of the Qurʾān.14 Both these scholarly works focus on the egali-
tarian aspects of the Qurʾān. Wadud and Barlas, both convincingly, and on the
authority of the Qurʾān, argue that the Divine message does not justify any
subjugation or repression of women. Further, it does not distinguish between
man and woman because they both are created from the single nafs (self). My
reading and analysis of all Sufi sources is in light of the gender exposition of
these two excellent studies.
Recent academic interest in Sufism and the growing number of studies on a
variety of aspects of Sufism, including translations of the older and “forgotten”
texts, is increasingly enriching scholarship. Studies on Sufism and Sufi women,

10 Netty Bonuvrié. 1995. ‘Female Sufi Saints on the Indian Subcontinent,’ in R. Kloppenborg
and W.J. Hanegraff (Edited). Female Stereotypes in Religious Traditions, (pp. 109–122).
Leiden: Brill, p. 109.
11 Laury Silvers. 2015. ‘Early pious, mystic Sufi women.’ Cambridge Companion to Sufism,
pp. 24–52.
12 I have purposely avoided listing such works out of my sheer respect for such efforts; at
least these books draw public attention to the presence of Sufi women and encourage the
culture of book-reading.
13 Amina Wadud. 1999. Qurʾan and Woman: Rereading the Sacred Text from a Woman’s
Perspective. New York: Oxford University Press.
14 Asma Barlas. 2019. Believing Women in Islam: Unreading Patriarchal Interpretations of the
Qurʾan. [University of Texas Press (First published in 2002)].
Introduction 7

written particularly for English-speaking audiences, have gained an unprec-

edented interest in readership worldwide. Of these seminal studies, some are
specific to certain locations of increasing geopolitical interest, some focus on
certain aspects and themes of Sufism, while few but significant ones, focus on
gender and women in Sufi discourses. There is a growing branch of anthro-
pological studies of themes linked with mystics that, spurred by the quest to
explore the exotic and charismatic universe of religious-affiliated cultures,
often choose to document the lived experiences of Sufi ṭarīqas and shrines.
Such studies take the reader on a walk-along exposure of ritualistic perfor-
mances, often with the observable presence of women both as participants
and as leaders. Overall, narrowing down the number of works used in this book
was important in keeping my focus on a singular track.
A well-established practice in modern scholarship is the production of
monographs. Most monographs are on individual male Sufis, with a focus on
the development of the mystical aura hallowing their personalities. Through
these studies, the individual, usually a male, looms larger than life and overpow-
ers the whole canvas. In addition to an indirect negation of self-annihilation
( fanāʾ) and the dissolution of the self (nafs), these works leave no room for
the other, mainly women. These personality-based studies have enriched and
expanded familiarity with the mystics and their ways, but the sheer number of
them compared to very few monographs on pious women transmits a message
that Sufi women are fewer in number. One reason for lack of monographs on
Sufi women is, of course, lack of source material. Despite this inadequacy of
sources, three women scholars, Margaret Smith, Valerie Hoffman, and, more
recently, Rkia Cornell, have presented mystic women’s biographies.
Among those who have refuted the conservative assumption that there were
few Sufi women, Margaret Smith made an admirable effort in the early twen-
tieth century by writing a biography of Rābiʿa al-Adawiyya after collating and
critically examining the most relevant primary sources, all authored by male
Sufis. Smith’s brief comment, in the conclusion of her work, that in addition
to Rābiʿa there were “many after her” indeed proved magnetic, attracting more
scholars to rescue and restore Sufi women to the main canon of history.15 More
studies followed this one, further and strongly stressing Muslim women’s pres-
ence in spirituality. Haifa Jawad’s basic argument is that Islam is not a mono-
lithic religion. It is prone to different and variant interpretations and readings.
She refutes that “Muslim women were and still are unable to gain religious

15 Margaret Smith. 1984. Rabiʿa the Mystic and her fellow-saints in Islam. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, p. 137.
8 Introduction

positions; some even go further by asserting that Islam does not permit women
to have a spiritual life.”16
Valerie Hoffman’s study (2004) is of Sayyida Nafīsa (762–824), the great-
granddaughter of the Prophet’s grandson, Imām Ḥusain. Sayyida Nafīsa’s
shrine is the most sacred space in Cairo. Sayyida Nafīsa is venerated by men
and women and is regarded as a guardian saint of Cairo. Though Hoffman has
not produced a monograph on Sayyida Nafīsa, however, she has highlighted
the role of this pious woman, through several academic papers.17 In her study,
included in the edited volume Women Saints in World Religions, Hoffman not
only presents the story of Sayyida Nafīsa in much detail, but also examines the
reasons behind the general apathy towards women and a noticeable element
of deep ambiguity regarding the recognition of women’s spiritual experiences
in male-created literary canon.18 Hoffman begins by recognising that as the
“Sufi literature is directed towards a male audience” and assumes “the superi-
ority of men over women [to be] the natural order.” Sayyida Nafīsa is consid-
ered as a model of Islamic sainthood for two reasons. First, by virtue of being
a direct descendant of the Prophet’s family, she has unquestioned veneration
and regard of the Muslim community. Second, because of her love for Allah,
she is counted among His friends. Though she lived a married life, Divine love
remained supreme in her life. Nothing deterred her from her path of devotion,
not even desertion by her husband.19
In the context of monographs, Cornell’s more recent work, a monograph on
Rāʿbia (2019), moves a step ahead of Smith’s earlier work in presenting a fresh
version and interpretation of the mystic by identifying the real female voice
missed in early male myths. With a skilled use of her source material, Cornell’s
work makes a distinction between oral traditions and later textual references
that she finds reflect bias.20 The work also builds our hope to look for and wel-
come more monographs on Sufi women.

16 Haifa Jawad. 2009. ‘Islamic Spirituality and the Feminine Dimension.’ In Women and the
Divine. Edied by G. Howie J. Jobling. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, p. 188.
17 Hoffman first began sharing her scholarship by presenting her paper ‘Sayyida Zaynab
and Sayyida Nafisa: The Contraction of Female Sainthood in Egypt,’ in 1995 at the Annual
Meeting of the Middle Eastern Studies Association (MESA) at the University of Arizona;
also, see Phyllis G. Jestice. 2004. Holy People of the World: a cross-cultural encyclopedia.
Santa Barbara (Calif.): ABC-CLIO, p. 119.
18 Valerie J. Hoffman. 2004. ‘Muslim Sainthood, women, and the Legend of Sayyida Nafisa,’
In Beyond the Exotic: Women’s Histories in Islamic Societies. Edited by A. Sonbol. Syracuse,
New York: Syracuse Press, pp. 107–144.
19 In 1994, while attending a conference in Cairo, I had an opportunity of visiting the shrines
of Bībī Sayyida Nafīsa and Bībī Sayyida Zainab and offering prayers there.
20 Rkia Elaroui Cornell. 2019. Rābiʿa from Narrative to Myth: The Many Faces of Islam’s Most
Famous Woman Saint, Rābiʿa al-ʿAdawiyya. New York, NY: Bloomsbury Academic.
Introduction 9

My first selection of texts comes from studies that focus on the presence
of gender in Sufism. Production of these texts broke ground for a new con-
ceptual framework, creating a fresh epistemology of gender. Before proceeding
further, it is significant to note that, like the Muslims who often tend to think in
terms of different versions of Islam according to their sect affiliations, Western
scholarship often tends to divide Islam into orthodox Islam and “other” Islam,
a category for which one single descriptive title to match the effectiveness of
“orthodox,” except popular Islam, has not yet gained currency. Some, too, have
used the term “vernacular” Islam. It is significant also to mention here that
spirituality-based thinkers and academics, such as Annemarie Schimmel, were
also trapped by the image of an “orthodox Islam.” Schimmel, for instance, said
that “Sufism, more than stern orthodoxy, offered women a certain amount of
possibilities to participate actively in the religious and social life.”21 She also
viewed the “other branches of Islam” when she commented that “the atti-
tude of Sufism toward the fair sex was ambivalent, and it can even be said
that Sufism was more favourable to the development of feminine activi-
ties than were other branches of Islam.”22 Contradicting her appraisal of the
Sufis’ ambivalence toward the “fair sex,” Schimmel states that “the Sufis were
well aware of the positive aspects of womanhood.”23 The constant presence
of strong misogynistic trends in Sufi thought, associating women with nafs,
the lower soul, in the form of a chaos-creating woman, “tries to ensnare the
pure spirit and thus bring him down into the trap of worldly life.”24 Schimmel’s
work, though produced more than four decades back, is still studied and cited
in research studies.
Seyyed Hossein Nasr, an accomplished scholar with a holistic understand-
ing of the social/political pressures of the Islamic community, acknowledged
the binary creation of humankind as revealed in the Qurʾān (49:13; 51:49; 53:45)
and revoked the erroneous concept of a male-only face of spirituality. Nasr,
invoking Ibn ʿArabī’s views on the concept of a Perfect Person (insān-i kāmil),
discussed the feminine dimension within Sufism.25 The presence of a feminine
dimension of Islam is traced to the ninety-nine Divine attributes (Asmāʾu’l

21 Mystical Dimensions of Islam, p. 426.

22 Ibid, p. 426.
23 Ibid, p. 429.
24 Ibid, p. 428.
25 Seyyed Hossein Nasr. 1994. “The male and the female in the Islamic perspective”.
Traditional Islam in the Modern World, 14 (1&2):47–58. Nasr, however, kept the translation
of the Qurʾān word insān as man, which should be a person or human being.
10 Introduction

Ḥusna).26 Nasr’s scholarship expanded further through his students and his
vast readership.
To give one example of how this aspect of the feminine in Islam was fur-
ther and more lucidly expanded, and how it reflected how women scholars
understand gender relationship and its impact on Sufi perceptions of women,
we may look at Sachiko Murata’s The Tao of Islam: A Sourcebook on Gender
Relationships in Islamic Thought (1992). Murata carries the dichotomic dis-
course on male-female aspects to new epistemological excellence. She exam-
ines in greater detail the feminine elements of the Islamic mystical traditions
which she analyses with the Taoist mystical symbolism. Indeed, the title of the
book is the perfect key to open a reader’s understanding of this mingling of
two traditions. The book’s inclusion in the reading lists of academic courses at
various universities around the world created a group of scholars who, inspired
by The Tao of Islam, generated a fresh understanding of female spirituality and
spurred more academic research of women who have dared to breathe spiri-
tuality. Murata’s treatment of the feminine element is influenced by the works
of Ibn ʿArabī who believed that women are the locus within which the form
of perfection is engendered. Murata wrote this unique book with a “feminist
agenda” with the aim “to re-establish the vision of the Divine Feminine,” which
she believes is the Essence of God, and that God’s ultimate and absolute Reality
(alḥaqīqat al-muṭlaqa) is “more deeply ‘feminine’ than ‘masculine.’”27
Closer to my own study is Saʿdiyya Shaikh’s study. She argues that “misogyny
is mirrored in Sufi literature which associates women ‘with the destructive
attractions of the commending soul,’” however, “within the Sufi paradigm, real
‘maleness’ symbolized more than gender.”28 Much earlier, Jamal Elias made
a distinction between the human female and the feminine by examining it
through women’s participation in Islamic traditions. A muslima, whom he
places at level one, is a human female. In social participation, the level of this
muslima, compared to her male counterpart, goes down. This he ascribes to
verse 2:288 of the Qurʾān. Unfortunately, Elias’s reading of the verse is quite a
confusing one as he selects only the last sentence of the Divine word of this
sura which has guidelines for women in a specific situation, i.e., divorced
women, and not all women in general. This verse, indeed, says that men have
more responsibilities than women in case of divorce. The second level, Elias

26 M.R. Bawa Muhaiyaddeen. 2015. Al-Asmāʾul-Ḥusnā: the duties and qualities of Allah.
Philadelphia: Pennsylvania, Fellowship Press.
27 Sachiko Murata.1992. The Tao of Islam. A Sourcebook on Gender Relationships in Islamic
Thought. Albany: SUNY, p. 324.
28 Saʿdiyya Shaikh. 2015. Sufi Narratives of Intimacy: Ibn Arabi, Gender, and Sexuality. Chapel
Hill: University of North Carolina Press, pp. 39–53.
Introduction 11

says, is “the feminine or the ideal woman who exists in the Muslim imagina-
tion, symbolizing virtue and divine compassion, an ideal to which all women
should aspire.”29
In the next category of studies that I found inspirational and useful for my
work are studies specific to one region. In modern times, these are easily iden-
tifiable by their individual country titles, but earlier these areas were parts of
larger clusters and identified either by the dominant ruling power or by eth-
nic and religious labels of their people. One such study which comes closer in
terms of theme and chronology is Hülya Küçük’s study of female Sufis of the
Mawlawiyya Sufi Order in Turkey.30 Hülya Küçük shows that the earlier tradi-
tion of Rūmī’s Order, the Mawlawiyya, officially appointing women Shaikhs
as heads of Mawlawi dargahs, later succumbed to the rise of what she defines
as “official” Islam. As Hülya Küçük notes, one reason why fewer women Sufis
are visible in records and texts is not because of their absence, but because
“fewer female saints [are] mentioned in Islamic biographies than male saints.”
Küçük, however, comments that “women were generally found not at the cen-
tre but the periphery of Sufi activities during this period.”31 This further led
to the belief that women cannot be spiritual directors. This observation of
Küçük comes close to my findings in this book. Küçük’s comment that even
Rūmī, despite his milder views about women, could not distance himself from
misogyny echoes to me the early Chishtī views on women, particularly Shaikh
Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar’s rejection of his daughter’s succession to the
throne. Linking the decline of women’s lead roles in Sufism to the weakening
of their social position, Küçük argues that some women are seen in the role of
spiritual guide in the Mawlawi order. Küçük is convinced of the presence of
leading female Sufis and Shaikhs during the early years of Sufism. These mys-
tic women lived in a relatively free social-religious environment and had male
masters and male disciples, but also enjoyed the occasional facility of having
special rooms for themselves at their homes. However, subsequent to the dete-
rioration of social position in societies, Muslim women lost their status as Sufi
Shaikhs. In several ways, Küçük’s study resonates some aspects of my book.

29 Jamal Elias. 1988. “Female and Feminine in Islamic Mysticism.” The Muslim World, 78(34):
209–224.
30 Hülya Küçük. 2013. “Female Substitutes and Shaykhs in the History of Sufism: The Case
of the Mawlawiyya Sufi Order from its Early Phase to the Eighteenth Century.” Mawlana
Rumi Review. 4: 106–131.
31 Ibid, p. 115.
12 Introduction

A recent excellent study is by Aziza Ouguir titled Moroccan Female Religious

Agents: Old Practices and New Perspectives.32 A well-researched work, the book
begins by introducing the spiritual connotations and the implications for
understanding the presence of women in religious practices. Ouguir empha-
sizes that women have been present all through the history of Islamic commu-
nities. In the context of the Muslims of Morocco, Ouguir makes a significant
point that Moroccan Muslims follow the Maliki school (mazhab) of jurispru-
dence which, instead of focusing on religious philosophy, focuses on social
reality. Thus, Moroccan Sufism, Ouguir says, is a product of society in crisis.
With the help of the life stories of a few women Sufis of the past and by meet-
ing women Sufis at shrines—who not only answered her queries but inspired
her to create more questions for her research—Ouguir’s work presents a com-
prehensive image of the current spiritual pursuits of Moroccan women. Thus,
in addition to archival material, fieldwork helped the author in producing this
work. This connection with the past is reflected in today’s Moroccan women’s
religious behaviour. These women define living women saints as their role mod-
els and seek their guidance to become “active religious agents” in their society.
Historical studies, in addition to identifying the original works and mining
their contents, often translate these texts from their original texts into various
languages familiar to their audiences. A great step forward in this direction
and indeed a pioneering work in this category, one which has opened new ave-
nues for assessing women Sufis, is by Rkia Elaroui Cornell. Cornell edited and
translated from Arabic in English Abū ʿAbdur-Raḥmān as-Sulamī’s (d. 412/1021)
Dhikr an-Niswa al-Mutaʿabidāt as-Ṣūfiyyāt (1999) which is an exclusive vol-
ume of Sufi women’s biographies. The reincarnation of the long-forgotten
work of as-Sulamī, the Dhikr an-Niswa through Rkia Cornell not only reintro-
duced to the modern-day reader the lost voices of women Sufis but, as Cornell
observes, demonstrates that in “Sufism’s formative period, women were not
so often excluded from the public aspects of spiritual life. As-Sulamī portrays
Sufi women as full equals of their male counterparts in religion and intellect,
as well as in their knowledge of Sufi doctrines and practices.”33 The text gives
biographical notices of eighty Sufi women, from the eighth and eleventh cen-
turies, selected from the region outside South Asia and mainly from what is
known as the central Islamic lands. The unmatched significance of this book,
in addition to the rediscovery of the lost knowledge about Sufi women, lies

32 Aziza Ouguir. 2020. Moroccan Female Religious Agents: Old Practices and New Perspectives.
Leiden: Brill.
33 Elaroui Rkia Cornell. 2005. Early Sufi women: Dhikr an-niswa al-Muta‘abbidāt aṣ-Ṣūfiyyāt.
Lahore: Suhail Academy, p. 20.
Introduction 13

in Cornell’s scholarly introduction which presents an analytical and critical

study of the nature of women’s spirituality, the persistent male devaluation of
women, done foremost by the “veiling of women’s voices” and thereby hiding
“the teaching and even the existence of Sufi women behind a veil of obscurity.”34
Cornell’s edited text is more than a translation. Her critical reading of
the original texts has enhanced the quality of her translation. This quality is
reflected in her sharp selection of key terms to define Sulamī’s understanding
of women and their spirituality. Cornell notes that for women, the Sufi way is
in servitude to Allah, which she explains as “the essence of women’s Sufism”
because it not only “freed women from the constraints imposed on them by
their physical natures,” but also invalidated the male assertion of women’s
intellectual deficiency.35 As-Sulamī testifies, as Cornell’s study shows, that Sufi
women’s level of intellect and wisdom is on par with that of men.36 Cornell’s
argument, here, directs women activists’ priorities into directions that hitherto
have not been fully explored.
In addition to her excellent exposition of her conceptualisation of women
and Sufism, the worth of this book is established by Cornell’s astute observa-
tion that “the continued mistrust of women and their spirituality among many
Sufis is a major reason why as-Sulamī’s work is so important to the study of
both Sufism and Islam today.”37 This observation of Cornell widens the horizon
of Dhikr an-Niswa, from categorising it as a time-bound biographical compen-
dium to the limitless zone of Islam, which to a believing Muslim is unbounded
by time and space. For researchers in the field of Sufi studies, Islamic mysti-
cism, and, most importantly, Sufi women, the resurfacing of Dhikr an-Niswa—
along with its English-language translation—is a positive bellwether for the
discovery of similar treasure-troves.
Another work falling within the category of biographies of pious women,
which primarily is not about Sufi women, is Women in Islamic Biographical
Collections: From Ibn Saʿd to Who’s Who, by Ruth Roded. In this work, cover-
ing a period from the early ninth century to the end of the twentieth century,
mystic women form only a part of the text; the others included are learned and
powerful women.38 Although Roded refers to some devout women who had
their separate lodges where they recited the Qurʾān, led prayers for women, and
held spiritual discourse sessions for them, she comments that “it is difficult to

34 Early Sufi women, p. 17.

35 Ibid, pp. 56–58.
36 Ibid, p. 50.
37 Ibid, p. 19.
38 Ruth Roded. 1994. Women in Islamic Biographical Collections: From Ibn Sa‘d to Who’s Who.
Boulder: L. Rienner Publishers.
14 Introduction

relate to the Sufi women as concrete historical personalities because of the

paucity of information about their identities.”39 More recently, and more
closely tied to this text, is the production of another ground-breaking study in
the category of biographies of Muslim women. Despite the overwhelming con-
tributory presence of women in the early stages of Islam and later in the trans-
mission of the authentic Traditions of the Prophet, the Muslim community
sadly has remained tenaciously tied to a chauvinistic understanding of gender
roles. Muḥammad Akram Nadwī has taken the scholarly investigative tradi-
tions which Saiyyid Sulaiman Nadwī introduced at the Darul Uloom Nadwatul
Ulama, Lucknow, to new heights, and has produced accounts of more than
eight thousand women scholars of the Traditions, offers convincing informa-
tion on this theme.40 Earlier, Saiyyid Sulaiman Nadwi, in several of his other
scholarly works, wrote on the activism of early Muslim women.41
At this stage, a question emerges. Have studies like the ones cited above really
make Sufi women more visible? Is the gap still there? Scholars and research-
ers, indeed, are not satisfied in the least as more research leads to more que-
ries, mainly about countries where Sufism flourished and still does, but where
women mystics remain hidden. Maria M. Dakake addresses this issue in her
essay “Guest of the Inmost Heart: Conceptions of the Divine Beloved among
Early Sufi Women.”42 She observes that “when our research regards the lives
of early Sufi women, our problems are further compounded by the fact that
at least until the later Middle Ages and early modern periods, we are entirely
dependent on the hagiographical record of male compilers.”43 One reason for
this missing information, she identifies, is that “women did not author their
own texts in the earliest periods of Islam, when female Sufi appear to have
been particularly abundant and active, and thus we have no fragments of their
own writing to serve as a basis from which to discern more effectively the effect
of varying hagiographical agendas on their historical legacy.”44 This is true in
the case of South Asia as well.

39 Women in Islamic biographical collections, p. 93, 106.

40 Moḥammad Akram Nadwī. 2016. Al-Muḥaddithāt: The Women Scholars in Islam. Oxford:
Interface Publications.
41 Saiyyid Sulaiman Nadwī. 1986. Hadhrat Ayesha Siddiqa: Her Life and Works (Safat, Kuwait:
Islamic Book Publishers. (Also, his earlier book, Musalmān ʿaurtoṅ kī bahādurī: yʿānī
Islāmī tamaddun ke mubarak ʿahd meṅ jin nāmwar Musalmān ʿaurtoṅ ne pālītiks meṅ
ḥiṣsṣa liyā hai … un ke mufaṣṣal wāqiʿāt aur sawānih). (Amritsar: Roz Bazar Steam Press,
1910).
42 Maria M. Dakake. 2007. “Guest of the Inmost Heart: Conceptions of the Divine Beloved
among Early Sufi Women.” Comparative Islamic Studies, 3, (1): pp. 72–97.
43 Ibid, p. 73.
44 Ibid, p. 73.
Introduction 15

In another interesting exposition, Dakake engages the reader in a discussion

of the male Sufis’ envisioning of a pious woman in the form of a man. Often
some tend to look at this as mere linguistic lacuna, or at best as a Sufi trope.
Dakake’s study is woven around her query that there is perhaps a feminine
strain of Islamic mysticism. This brings her to her next query about whether
women who follow the mystical path do it because they have acquired male
attributes. Here she mainly looks at Farīdu’d-Dīn ʿAttār’s famously quoted
phrase that a woman who journeys like a man on the spiritual path cannot be
called a woman. She is a man. In Dakake’s view, this was “one way in which the
presence of these women in the public sphere—their attachment to male Sufi
shaykhs and their social interaction with their male counterparts—could be
legitimized in the face of strict Islamic insistence upon the necessary separa-
tion of unrelated men and women.”45
Some other recent studies, though few in number, are theme specific and in
the selection of these themes come closer to several aspects of the Sufi ways
that have not been judiciously explored and analysed. Ashk P. Dahlén’s study
“Female Sufi Saints and Disciples: Women in the Life of Jalāl al-dīn Rūmī”
focuses on Rūmī’s connections with women which include his mother and
wives. Rūmī, as Dahlén’s study shows, had a liberal view of gender relationships
which resulted in letting women “play a distinguished role as transmitters of
hagiographic material in the early Maulawī tradition.” However, Dahlén also
acknowledges that “fragmentary presence of women in the hagiographical lit-
erature hinders to construct their biographies.”46 Of course, each scholar and
researcher is free to arrive at a conclusion that he or she finds to be the best.
Some other studies which I find relevant to my work are theme specific.
Among these is Salamah-Qudsi’s study of mother images and roles in classi-
cal Sufism. As the genesis of my book lies in Professor Muhammad Mujeeb’s
recommendation to me to study the memorable life of the mother of Khwāja
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, Salamah-Qudsi’s study attracted me further. This study,
despite inadequacy of available data, is rightly viewed by Salamah-Qudsi as a
nucleus for future research.47 Salamah-Qudsi brings out another point which
further increased my interest in her work. She correctly points out that refer-
ence to the Sufis “as family members were not part of the general biographical

45 Maria Massi Dakake. 2006. ‘“Walking upon the path of God like men”? Women and
the Feminine in the Islamic Mystical Tradition.’ In Sufism, Love & Wisdom. Edited by
Jean-Louis Michon and Roger Gaetani. Indian: World Wisdom, pp. 131–151.
46 A. Dahlén. 2008. “Female Sufi Saints and Disciples: Women in the life of Jalāl al-dīn Rūmī.”
Orientalia Suecana, 57: 46–62.
47 Arin Shawkat Salamah-Qudsi.2011. “A Lightning Trigger or a Stumbling Block: Mother
Images and Roles in Classical Sufism”. Oriens. 39 (2): 199–226.
16 Introduction

tradition of medieval Islam. If we seek to put the focus on the roles of early
Sufis as family members, spouses and providers, while seeking to re-examine
questions of celibacy, marriage and familial commitments among them, we
need to retrieve data from the existing biographical material which has come
to us mainly in the form of structured units of sayings and episodes with very
few references to personal backgrounds and family ties.”48 Salamah-Qudsi’s
observation about male Sufis that “complaints and utterances against one’s
familial ties and duties that prevent the sincere ascetic or mystic from practis-
ing a perfect devotional life with God are not indicative of the actual lives of
those who said them,” resonate Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī (1650–1729), who con-
demns wives to the extent of equating them with highway robbers.49
Fatima Mernissi, a Moroccan sociologist, in 1977 opened a new vista for
understanding women’s spirituality by writing a short essay, Women, Saints and
Sanctuaries. The subheadings of this essay have later emerged in the form of
full theses by scholars. An ardent and passionate scholar determined to make
Muslim women visible in history,50 Mernissi introduced an unusual argument
in academic discourse, emphasising that women’s mystic shrine visitation, in
North Africa, is not merely a religious ritual; it is a sign of their active involve-
ment with their existing society and marks an expression of their dissatisfac-
tion with it. To pay homage and to thank Mernissi for her bold assessment of
women’s shrine visitation, which generally earns male religious scholars’ con-
demnation, I must quote her. She writes that the shrines that are the “locus of
anti-establishment, anti-patriarchal mythical figures, provide women with a
space where complaint and verbal vituperations against the system’s injustices
are allowed and encouraged.”51
I now move to a brief overview of shrine-based studies about South Asia
as the number of shrine-related studies about other regions is too large.
Sufi-based studies mostly tend to be ethnographic in nature and document
women’s presence and participation in Sufi rituals, such as devotional poetry
recitation, dance, and healing rituals. These shrine-based studies offer rich
information on how ordinary women negotiate with their spiritual yearn-
ings in their everyday lives. A distinguishing feature of most ethnographies on

48 Arin Shawkat Salamah-Qudsi. 2019. Sufism and early Islamic piety: personal and commu-
nal dynamics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 25–26.
49 Letter no. 30, Shāh Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī. 1315/1897. Maktūbāt-i Kalīmī. Dehli: Maktabā-i
Mujtaba‌ʾi. P. 30.
50 Fatima Mernissi. 1977. “Women Saints, and Sanctuaries.” Signs: Journal of Women in
Culture and Society, 3 (1): 101–12.
51 Ibid, p. 111, quoted in Susan S. Morrison. 2000. Women Pilgrims in Late Medieval England:
Private Piety as Public Performance. London: Routledge, p. 34.
Introduction 17

South Asian Muslim women’s traditional religious and spiritual ritual perfor-
mances is that these works portray female religiosity not within women-only
spheres, but in male shrines as well.
One unique feature of these studies is their documentation of women vis-
itors at the shrines of male Sufis. One such study by Pnina Werbner (2003)
of the most influential shrines of Pakistan suggests the importance of the
Naqshbandi Sufi shrine of Ghamkol Sharif in Kohat of Ḥaẓrat Zinda Pīr (1912–
1999). This one is of great interest because of women’s visible presence at the
shrine and their active participation as facilitators during the highly crowded
ʿurs celebrations, which lasts for several days, thus warranting women’s pro-
longed stay. Ordinarily these details would be of no significance. In the con-
text of most of these women being members of the Pashtun community who
are mostly presented as staunch upholders of women’s subordinated position
and strict enforcement of veiling, the study becomes more than the study of
a shrine and its baraka. Werbner met, interviewed, and photographed these
women devotees who come from all over Pakistan to seek the blessings. They
also participate as volunteers in communal activities at the shrine, mainly
preparing meals for the large number of devotees, including the male visitors.
Another such work that women do out of love for Allah is to prepare mud
ovens for cooking and baking meals. Werbner describes women’s gesture of
exposing their faces in front of the Shaikh by drawing their veils above their
heads as an expression of their “belief that the saint transcends sexuality. His
persona combines male and female qualities—the gentleness, love and ten-
derness of a woman, the power, authority and honour of a man.”52
Werbner’s study makes several connections with my book. Her observation
that “the vigour of Sufism in South Asia remains quite remarkable,”53 indirectly
also warrants more studies on Sufism, and on themes that show continuity of
spiritual traditions. One such continuity is the belief that saints are not to be
considered dead in the ordinary sense of one being dead. She argues, in light
of what she learned during her prolonged stay at the shrine and her scholar-
ship, that “the persona of a saint, alive or dead, his very body, is believed by Sufi
followers to irradiate divine sanctity.”54 This belief, making the saint transcen-
dental, is not in conflict with the followers’ belief in God. Indeed, as she fur-
ther explains, when a physically dead saint becomes “a conduit of God’s grace
in the world,” mystics, supplicants, followers, and disciples “do not confuse

52 Pnina Werbner. 2003. Pilgrims of Love. The Anthropology of a Global Sufi Cult. Bloomington:
Indiana University Press, p. 122.
53 Ibid, p. 11.
54 Ibid, p. 11.
18 Introduction

the saint with God himself. It is God’s intimacy which is venerated.”55 Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, as cited in this book, repeatedly emphasised this belief
that the holy persons do not die; their baraka remains active.
Kelly Pemberton’s academic interest in Sufi shrines of India dates back
to 1994. Later, she conducted an ethnographic field-based research at three
Sufi shrines: the Chishti shrine of Gudri Shah in Ajmer (Rajasthan) and the
Firdausi shrines at Patna and Maner, in Bihar, India. Her study, based upon
women’s lived experiences at these three locations, shows how women can
function as spiritual guides even though they do not have sanction for this by
the established Sufi silsilas. Interviews with several women spiritual guides
included in her work testify that, despite lack of authorisation, women pīrs
feel free to work as spiritual guides.56 Thus, the sheer presence of women in
their two roles, as disciples and followers and as vehicles of spiritual blessings
in their role as spiritual guides, women make their presence visible in spaces
that are marked as male domain. The issue of women’s succession as heads of
the Sufi silsilas, as my study also shows, is a historic issue.
Women have found successful solutions for this issue. One such solution,
Kelly notes, is of women exercising their spiritual authority as de facto pirs
(ritual specialists) in smaller shrines.57 Women’s spiritual authority, similar
to their social authority, is influenced and shaped by several factors, such as
their ancestry, family background, marital status, and prevailing discourses on
gender identity in their society. Performance of this spiritual authority, Kelly
argues, can also provide women an opportunity to “become the catalysts for
change”; however, all women are mandated to act within the boundaries of
“feminine modesty and subordination to male authority” set by the dominant
hegemonic culture.58
Flueckiger’s ethnographic study completed in 2006 in Hyderabad, India,
presents some aspects of ritual healing practices which, though they do not
relate directly to the focus of this book, throw light on women’s behaviour
in seeking spiritual healing. Interestingly, the main woman healer, Amma, in
Flueckiger’s narrative, does not belong to traditional healers or to a family of
Sufi descendants. The environment where this healing room is situated, is a
university complex. What brings women to Amma, as told by women visitors
of Amma, is her patient and attentive listening to their tales of woe and mis-
ery. The crowd that assembled in her courtyard was a mix of all religions. In
Amma’s own words, according to Flueckiger, “There are only two castes: men

55 Ibid, p. 12.
56 Kelly Pemberton. 2010. Women Mystics and Sufi Shrines in India. Columbia: University of
South Carolina Press, p. xvii.
57 Ibid, p. 2.
58 Ibid, p. 11, 24.
Introduction 19

and women. Hindus, Muslims, Christians—they’re all the same.” This is star-
tling because what this semi-educated woman says is the sum of age-long find-
ings of feminist research. Flueckiger, however, identifies the work of Amma
and of her husband, Abba (both these words are not the names of the couple,
they stand for mother and father) as a manifestation of what she labels as ver-
nacular Islam. Finally, a word about how research often impacts the researcher.
Living miles away from Hyderabad, she was told in her dream of the passing
away of Abba.59
Shemeem Burney Abbas conducted research from 1992 to 1999 in several
shrines in Pakistan, studying women’s voices in Sufi music and songs, which
indeed is a unique tradition at shrines in Pakistan, mainly in the Panjab and
more prominently in Sindh.60 This magnificent ethnographic work’s focus, as
reflected so well in the title, The Female Voice in Sufi Ritual: Devotional Practices
of Pakistan and India, transports these voices to the reader. Abbas’s work is
strong evidence of women’s presence in Sufi traditions in Pakistan. Abbas
boldly asserts in her opening statement that “although there is a long history
of women’s participation in the many dimensions of Sufi life, that is, in the
traditions of Islamic mysticism, there has been no adequate documentation
of it in literature.”61 A startling observation of Abbas, which she records with
the help of her interviews of the female and male singers at shrines, is about a
different impact of Sufi rituals on the lives of those who usually are neither Pīrs
nor Murīds, in the traditional sense of these two terms, though they have deep
devotional links which are inspirational. These people are singers of devo-
tional songs, which in the South Asian devotional psyche are the most effec-
tive expression of spirituality. Tracing the roots of the presence of female voice
in Sufism, Abbas moves to the representation of the female in Shah Abdul
Latif’s poetry. Shah Latif Bhitai, or Bhit Shah, the most dearly loved saint-
poet in Pakistan, in his Shah Jo Risālo, a collection of his devotional poetry,
has created female characters that are now symbols of womanhood in Sindh.62
Abdul Latif Bhitai (1689–1752) composed poems in honour of the Prophet of
Islam from a feminine point of view. An earlier study by Ali S. Asani argued
that this voice of the woman is usually that of a bride or a bride-to-be, who

59 Flueckiger, Joyce Burkhalter. 2006. In Amma’s Healing Room. Gender and Vernacular Islam
in South India. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
60 Shemeem Burney Abbas. 2002. The Female Voice in Sufi Ritual: Devotional Practices of
Pakistan and India. Austin: University of Texas Press.
61 Ibid, p. 1.
62 For a more nuanced imagery of women in Bhitai’s work, see Fahmida Husain. 2001. Image
of ‘woman’ in the poetry Shah Abdul Latif. Karachi: Shah Abdul Latif Chair: University of
Karachi Press.
20 Introduction

is tormented by the absence of her husband. The singing platform of these

devotional poems, Asani says, is spread all through the villages and towns of
Sindh and includes religious assemblies, wedding celebrations, and sometimes
mourning assemblies.63
Most studies related to Sufism in Pakistan and women’s presence in Sufi
traditions are shrine-focused, with emphasis on their shrine visitation and
performance of shrine-related rituals including singing and dhammal dancing
(a dance performance in devotional trance or an ecstatic dancing). Scholars
like Jürgen Wasim Frembgen, Michel Boivin and Omar Kasmani have anal-
ysed women’s roles and status within shrines and rituals of Sufism in Pakistan.
From a different perspective, Frembgen, in his book At the Shrine of the Red
Sufi: Five Days and Nights on Pilgrimage in Pakistan, looks at the women danc-
ers of dhammal and notes that women’s performances break the traditional
concept of gender boundaries. Indeed, one female dancer described her dance
not as dance, but as an “offering to the Qalandar.” Frembgen not only interprets
this dance offering as “an outlet for pain and suffering” of the woman dancer,
but says that the Shahbaz Qalandar shrine at Sehwan Sharif provides a space,
which is not available anywhere else, for women to express the vitality of their
bodies. A shrine, in Frembgen’s estimation, is a place void of all sorts of social
rifts, discords, and hierarchies.64
Michel Boivin and Remy Delage’s edited ethnographic work on Sufis shrines
of South Asia, Devotional Islam in Contemporary South Asia: Shrines, Journeys
and Wanderers, explores various aspects and dimensions of Sufism in con-
temporary South Asia.65 The papers included in this volume indeed take the
sojourner on a journey from the shrine of Hinglāj Devī/Bībī Nānī in Baluch-
istan, through Ghāzī Miyān’s resting place in Makanpur in northern India,
and traversing Pakpattan and Sehwan.66 Boivin’s paper argues that religious
devotion of the Muslims is rooted in devotion for the Prophet. It looks at the
various other aspects of devotion, links it to sacred space, and studies it as a
“practiced space.” Boivin looks at this space “where many things are possible,

63 Ali S. Asani. 1988. “Sufi Poetry in the Folk Tradition of Indo-Pakistan,” Religion and
Literature, 20 (1): 81–94.
64 Jürgen Wasim Frembgen. 2012. At the Shrine of the Red Sufi: Five Days and Nights on
Pilgrimage in Pakistan. Oxford University Press.
65 Michel Boivin. 2016. ‘Authority, Shrines, and Spaces. Scrutinizing Devotional Islam
from South Asia.’ In Devotional Islam in Contemporary South Asia: Shrines, Journeys, and
Wanderers. Edited by Michel Boivin and Remy Delage. London: Routledge, pp. 1–11.
66 Michel Boivin and Remy Delage. 2016. Devotional Islam in Contemporary South Asia:
Shrines, Journeys, and Wanderers. London: Routledge.
Introduction 21

despite the control taken by powerful lobbies.”67 Thus, Boivin views the shrine
space beyond its physical aspect as the last resting place of a venerated person.
In Boivin’s estimation, the shrine’s sacred place and space is open to new social
negotiations and is to some extent “like a distorted mirror of the interwoven
strata of local, regional, and national society.”68 Regarding the position of
women in Sufi and particularly shrine culture, Boivin also reiterates the shared
concern of researchers regarding scant studies in this field. To address this
inadequacy, he recommends more research investigating the place of women’s
authority further and with a more holistic approach. This new approach, he
suggests, should avoid the traditional depiction of women as “clients” of the
shrines. Women’s spiritual authority and their agency should be examined.69
Kasmani, whose paper is also included in this edited volume, explores
women visitors to shrines not as passive numbers present there; he searches
for their agency as part of the shrines’ agency. This revealing study was con-
ducted at Sehwan Sharif, which Kasmani calls “a place of confluence” as all
categories of men, women, and transgender find equal space at the shrine and
so also followers of all faiths. Kasmani’s association with shrines is spread over
years. In 2012, he interviewed several women fakirs (religious mendicants) at
the shrine of Usman Marwandi—known as Lal Shahbaz Qalandar (d. 1274)—
in Sehwan Sharif.70 Despite their visible presence, Kasmani in 2016 wrote:
“Seldom do women of these accounts enjoy an influence over a male in public,
and neither do they, unlike the fakirs, take up roles of spiritual authority that
are customarily reserved for men.”71
Taken together, these studies document women’s shrine visitation and
examine women’s spirituality through this prism, indeed recognising the sig-
nificance of oral traditions. Valerie Hoffman traces the presence of the author-
ity of women’s voice of foundational significance in the collection of Ḥadīth.
In this context, she emphasises the central role of the voice of Ḥaẓrat ʿAʾisha,
the Prophet’s addressed as Ummu’l muʾminīn (the Mother of the faithful). She

67 Michel Boivin. 2016. ‘Authority, Shrines, and Spaces. Scrutinizing Devotional Islam from
South Asia.’ p. 4.
68 Ibid, p. 4.
69 I bid, p. 7.
70 Omar Kasmani. 2012. “Of Discontinuity and Difference: Gender and Embodiment Among
Fakirs of Sehwan Sharif”. Oriente Moderno. 92 (2): 439–457.
71 Omar Kasmani. 2016. ‘Women[un-]like Women. The question of spiritual authority
among female fakirs of Sehwan Sharif.’ In Devotional Islam in Contemporary South Asia:
Shrines, Journeys and Wanderers. Edited by Michel Boivin and Remy Delage. London:
Routledge, pp. 47–62, here p. 57.
22 Introduction

rightly argues that the sources of Sufi biographical studies, for the most part,
“are simply collections of orally transmitted materials.”72
It is true that in order to know the veiled lives of Sufi women, it is important
that oral traditions are valued, respected, audited, and recorded.

2 Research Methods and Process

This book evolved in its present form through several years of research. During
this time, my approach to the understanding of Sufi women underwent con-
siderable changes. The more I read and interacted with people, the more I
realised that the real understanding of Sufi women’s piety and of their mysti-
cal experience lies in exploring the cultural context of these experiences. The
many conversations I had with both men and women helped in identifying
the major themes for my research. One theme that kept reoccurring was the
persistent image of a Sufi as a man. Women, I was told, with huge emphasis, are
pious women (nek bībīāṅ). The khādims of the dargahs have the same under-
standing. Most women I met concurred with this perception. Among the men
and women, I spoke with were religious academics as well. Some shied away
from answering me directly, respecting my known stand on women’s issues.
Their written answers, too, were evasive lest the signed paper could be used in
defaming them. This evasion led me to a vigorous search for Sufi women.
As the canvas of my study expanded, my research questions also kept chang-
ing, eventually adjusting my research methods to my new goals. The major
thrust, however, remained unchanged. The goal of all my academic pursuits, in
conducting my research, in sharing my research with students on school cam-
puses, and even in random conversations, is recognising and making known
women’s presence.
To be more specific, this book, as the title declares, is to make South Asian
Sufi women’s presence visible. Long before I decided to begin my academic
study of Sufi women, I was totally convinced that Sufi women have always
existed. There are hosts of other academics who have confirmed this before
my conviction. Dakake’s words that “women are also among the well-known
practitioners of the mystical path in Islam” make me feel that I am not the only

72 Valarie J. Hoffman, 2005. ‘Oral Traditions as a Source for the Study of Muslim Women:
Women in the Sufi Orders.’ In Beyond the Exotic: Women’s Histories in Islamic Societies.
Edited by A. Sonbol. Syracuse University Press, pp. 365–380.
Introduction 23

one to realise this.73 In reality, however, little is known about these women.
I am convinced beyond a doubt that male authoritarian versions of the past
have made women invisible in historical records or minimised their roles.
Salvaging these hidden stories before they disappear completely was of para-
mount importance. The strategy I adopted for knowing the forgotten tales of
these women included tapping into all kinds of sources and resources, ranging
from libraries and archives to human memory and human experience. Tracing
backwards the roots of present-day social issues, in my experience, helps one
in identifying their roots. Thus, I always begin learning the past through the
present.74 Further, this book is not merely an exercise in collating scattered
and sparse fragments from remote writings; the book’s purpose is to explore
how women understood and engaged with authority and leadership. Was it
diagonally based? Was it horizontally structured? Was it implanted in a verti-
cal fashion?
One difference I noticed early on is that, unlike the accounts of mystic
women from other Muslim societies, accounts of the pious women of South
Asia do not convey the spoken words of Sufi women, even briefly,75 though
some valuable exceptions exist. One such example, which is authentic because
of the credibility of both the narrators, i.e., Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ
and his reporter, Ḥasan Sijzi, is the unique conversation between Ḥaẓrat
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ and Bībī Fāṭima Sām, at the latter’s house, on his mar-
riage prospects. The topic was broached by Bībī Fāṭima Sām who suggested
to Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ that he consider getting married. The theme was
rather an unusual one, though not an impolite one. The Shaikh, though young
in age, with a fascinating appearance, excused himself from considering the
marriage proposal, because marriage had never been in his cards. The element
of surprise in this brief episode, however, lies in Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ
recounting an earlier episode that happened when he was a novice at Khwāja
Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar’s Jamāʿat khāna. A visiting Jogi explained to
Khwāja Farīdu’d-Dīn, while the young Nizāmu’d-Dīn was listening attentively,
that cohabiting on certain days ensures begetting a son or results in some

73 Maria M. Dakake. 2007. “‘Guest of the Inmost Heart’: Conceptions of the Divine Beloved
among Early Sufi Women.” Comparative Islamic Studies, 3 (1): pp. 72–97.
74 This strategy, earlier helped me in locating the lost manuscript of the autobiography
of Shahr Bano Begam. See Tahera Aftab. 2012. A story of Days Gone By: A Translation of
Bītī kahānī: An Autobiography of Princess Shahr Bano Begam of Pataudi. Karachi: Oxford
University Press.
75 One such example is AbūʿAbdar-Raḥmān as-Sulamī’s Dhikr an-Niswa al-Mutaʿabidāt
as-Ṣūfiyyāt. In this compendium, notices, though short, but almost all these narratives
reflect a first-person point of view.
24 Introduction

other benefits. Observing the young Nizāmu’d-Dīn’s interest, Khwāja Farīdu’d

remarked that the information was of no use for him, because he was not going
to marry.76 Hearing this story, Bībī Fāṭima Sām said that now she understands
the nature of his refusal. This episode is the only direct reference to a conversa-
tion between a Sufi woman and a Sufi man in the early history of Sufis in South
Asia. The nature of the dialogue, the theme of the conversation, and the tone
of its frankness are significant. The conversation is free of the shackles of gen-
der norms that normally proscribe any reference to sexual intimacy when men
and women talk. Further, here in this episode, Bībī Fāṭima Sām, a Sufi woman
of great virtue, displays caring traits that are the hallmark of a woman’s psyche.
A celibate herself, she neither promoted nor extolled celibacy as the Sufi way.
Instead, she acted, here is this episode, as a matchmaker—an almost univer-
sally favoured hobby of women. The story enamoured me. It became my key
to open the doors to the hidden world of women Sufis. The story guided me to
conversations with people. More on the importance of conversations, as one of
my research methods, is discussed latter.
Another story from Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ further chiselled my
search tools. Explaining the complex concept of wilāyat and walāyat, in sim-
plest words, he said walāyat is the relationship between people and a Shaikh
(miyān-i khalq). It can be passed on from a Master to his disciple. Wilāyat
is based on a special kind of love (khās muḥabbat) between God and a Sufi
(miyān-i ḥaqq).77 Because women Sufis, as a norm, are not known to be a part
of the Sufi hierarchical power structure, I begin to explore the locus of their
spirituality in their connections with the people around them. This love for the
Divine results in obedience (taʿabbud) to Allah. Taṣawwuf, the generic term for
the anglicised term Sufism, in essence is taʿabbud. For as-Sulamī, who had been
in the company of the Sufis and had read about all Sufis, both men and women,
“taʿabbud is the essence of women’s Sufism,” notes Rkia Cornell.78
This anecdote also helped to answer for me, though subtly and in an indi-
rect fashion, some of the questions I had created for myself. For instance: What
is the make of a woman Sufi? Is she different from Sufi men? If so, in what
ways, and how? Are these differences, differences of the interior (bāṭin) or of
the exterior (zāhir)? Did they love Him, or were they afraid of Him? Did they
also go through ṣalāt-i māʿkūs, as did Khwāja Farīdu’d-Dīn to Ganj-i Shakkar? If

76 FF, Majlis 19, 11 of Zil Ḥajj, 720/1321.

77 FF, Majlis 14, 7th Muḥarram, 708/1308.
78 Elaroui Rkia Cornell. 2005. Early Sufi Women: Dhikr an-niswa al-Muta‘abbidāt aṣ-Ṣūfiyyāt.
Lahore: Suhail Academy, p. 54.
Introduction 25

they did not, was their quest for the Divine lacking in devotion, or was it simply
because they could not, because of their “innate deficiency”?
This conceptual understanding generated more questions. Searching for the
answers to these questions became synonymous with my journey to discover
the lives of Sufi women. I realised, early in my research, that I was not a lonely
sojourner. There were, indeed, many; and so were their pathways, varied and
different. Destinations they wanted to see, though, varied according to their
charted route.
I chose an amalgamation of various research strategies and methods,
to understand the past and to connect it with the present. A research with
a canvas as vast as this book, in terms of space and time and personalities,
has taken a multipronged approach. Indeed, for all historical research, multi-
pronged research is quintessential. Written words and texts are one of the vari-
ous channels of communication, documentation, and preservation of human
thoughts and action. Memory, both individual and public, is the best reposi-
tory of oral traditions. In this book, I present the lives of Sufi women found
in both hagiographical accounts and biographical compendiums, supported
by conversations with women devotees. These women devotees are conserva-
tors, narrators, and creators of the sacred traditions. Applying a multifaceted
research methodology, this research, thus, investigates historical writings, hagi-
ographical literature, biographical compendiums, oral sources, ethnographic
studies, travelogues, and internet sources, combined with interviews and
in-depth discussions to find answers to some significant questions with the
purpose of writing biographical sketches of Sufi women and producing a new
understanding of gender roles and the gendered nature of religious behaviour
and practices. Some of these questions are: (a) what caused negligence, omis-
sion, or suppression of women’s life-stories in the Sufi canon? (b) does sparse
information about Sufi women reflect hesitation to accept women as Sufis, or
is it symptomatic of the flaws of writing craft? (c) how does women’s experi-
ence of religious and social traditions differ from those of men, if at all? (d)
to what extent are religious and cultural traditions used to create, strengthen,
and sustain gender inequalities in South Asian societies? (e) do women find
their religious practices liberating or exploitative and oppressive? and finally,
(f) what is the male perception of women Sufis today?
Because the early Sufi malfūzāt were basically a one-man story, recorded by
one man, I read these works with much caution. This became my basic meth-
odology for handling contemporary foundational sources. The recollections of
two different individuals will result in vast differences in the two versions of
the story. Also, the presence or absence of a scribe plays a significant role in
documenting the conversations. As memories are always shifting, changing,
26 Introduction

and sifting, malfūzāt—which basically are oral data and memory generated—
need to be validated by other relevant sources. The medieval authors of South
Asia did not attempt this; they simply replicated the stories of the malfūzāt,
often word for word, with no validation process involved. Later writers, includ-
ing modern ones, picked these stories and included them in their works.
To illustrate my argument, I refer to the story of Bībī Sāra (d. 1240), the
mother of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad. Her name is mentioned first
in Fawa‌ʾid ul-fuʾād when Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ recalled people’s mis-
ery caused by an acute draught in Delhi. To redress this calamity, on people’s
insistence, Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad, holding the scarf of her
mother, prayed for rainfall. (This story is given in more detail in the biographi-
cal section, so I avoid further details here.) Here, my argument is that Ḥaẓrat
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ is not narrating the life story of the mother or the son.
He was teaching his audience the effectiveness of beseeching God by afflicted
people in time of distress. Connecting with God, through remembering Him,
is the spirit of the Sufi way. Indeed, nothing substantial is found about Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad in other accounts. The apathy of the medieval
scribe towards details and accuracy of facts is frustrating. Thus, some of these
compilations are more a result of the hard labour of an excellent copyist, and
less than the work of a rationalist author.
In view of this void in the Sufi cannon, I made a concentrated effort to
explore other sources. I am sure that there are many such texts present some-
where that I could not access. Huge sources in South Asia are still lying unno-
ticed, undocumented, and in a neglected state in remote shrines and khānqāhs.
I am hugely frustrated when my efforts to get access to family documents in the
possession of the descendants of Miāṅ Muḥammad Kāmil (d. 1239/1823), in
reconstructing the narrative of his daughter, Māʾī Khadīja (notice included in
this book) failed.
My other research method, which is parallel in its significance and richness
of results, is visits to the shrines and dialogues with women devotees at the
shrines. I must hastily point out here that the importance I assign to shrines
led me to identify an aged and ailing woman in Karachi, almost nearing her
end, who recalled for me her childhood visit to the shrine of Bībī Kamāl or
Bībī Kamālo, the twelfth-century pious woman buried in Kāko, Bihar, India.
Because of her advanced age and a speech-related ailment, the conversation
was fractured and often hard to understand. (Her children, too, were unable to
understand her, as in her old age she had dramatically reversed to her original
childhood dialect of a remote rural area of Bihar.) What is important in this
conversation, however, is that the woman still cherished memories of her visit
to Bībī Kamāl. Her narration, though mostly inaudible, not only confirmed the
Introduction 27

accounts that I read in the Archaeological Survey Reports, but it also confirmed
that Bībī Kamālo was venerated for curing the possessed and the mentally ill.
I could pick up from her words that probably one of her paternal unmarried
aunts was taken to the shrine for treatment.
Thus, unlike most research studies, which focus on women’s biographies
and begin by surveying published scholarly works, my search began, first, with
my visits to the shrines, including the shrines of Sufi men. In 1986, I visited the
shrines of Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ and of Jahān Ᾱrāʾ Begam. Though the
two shrines were in close proximity, the visible ambience of the two spaces
was in sharp contrast: the highly engaging eloquence of the khādims at the
shrine of Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, compared with the serenity and a sort
of deserted appearance of the grave of Jahān Ᾱrāʾ Begam. This contrast left me
wondering about our gendered perceptions and behaviours. The presence of
women, more in number at the shrine of Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ and
their total absence around that of Jahān Ᾱrāʾ Begam, was yet another point of
concern for me. As a note of clarification, I am not comparing the two person-
alities or their shrines. Though I do not intend to record my personal apprecia-
tion and devotion for Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, however, I must say that
his role as a leader who energized the people and the state towards peace-
building and people’s welfare remains unmatched.
At all the shrines that I visited, I met with countless women devotees and
conducted 125 documented interviews, some of which were audio-recorded.
I also took photographs and made short video-recordings. The oral data was
then painstakingly turned into the written word and was later translated from
the local spoken idiom to the English language. This process, familiar to all
those who work in the field of ethnography, is both joyful and painful. The
readers of the translated word in print enjoy it as it transports them into
regions they may have never thought to visit. The researcher, who has been
through this whole process, experiences a pain caused by the loss of signifi-
cant data which probably only an audiovisual film can portray. The transcribed
text loses the speakers’ cultural expressions, body language, facial gestures, lin-
guistic nuances, and even the pauses. Shrines, where I met and interviewed
women, were places where both worlds, the here and the Hereafter (dīn wa
dunyā), meet in a natural way as two water currents coming from opposite
directions meet and merge with each other.
Contrary to the norms of women’s segregation from male gatherings, which
is now gaining more acceptance, women remain visible at the shrines of male
Sufis. Although some shrines debar women from certain premarked spaces,
most shrines follow relaxed rules. I have noticed and even photographed
women standing alongside male shrine visitors, though not blood-related to
28 Introduction

them. For example, at the shrine of Ḥaẓrat ʿAbdu’llah Shah Ghāzi in Karachi, a
woman devotee told me that the darbār of the Bābā (father) gives them much-
needed tranquillity (sakūn) and their contractual vows (mannat) are answered
and fulfilled.
My third research methodology was to offer teaching courses and semi-
nars on Sufi women, either as a separate course or as a unit within a teaching
course, on women’s spirituality, women and religion, and women’s history, in
Pakistan and in the USA. This served various academic purposes, in addition to
fulfilling my responsibilities as course instructor. Foremost, it made spiritual
women visible in the learning process. It placed spiritual women of all beliefs
and faiths in the role of leaders. More importantly, it contributed actively to
the enrichment of my research methodology. Discussions with students always
add new and fresh dimensions to an instructor’s perception. In my case, this
even resulted in new stories and identification of new shrines in Karachi. For
instance, Māʾī Gāŕhī was identified for me by a student who had often com-
muted through the Northern Bypass in Karachi.
Sufi Women of South Asia: Veiled Friends of God, thus, makes new connec-
tions between the pious women of the past and those who trust in women’s
potentials by enlivening the forgotten icons of piety and devoutness.
 Part 1
Sufis, Sufism, and Transformations

⸪
 Chapter 1

Setting the Scene

1.1 Evolution of the Muslim Community in South Asia

An overall assessment of the vast topic of the arrival, evolution, and growth of
the Muslim community in South Asia requires a separate monograph. Indeed,
even a brief appraisal of this multifaceted phenomenon and a survey of the rel-
evant literature would distract the readers from the focus of the present work.
The vast geographic region of South Asia, from prerecorded history to the pres-
ent times, has welcomed hordes of people of different descents and ethnici-
ties, speaking different languages and dialects and professing variant beliefs,
coming there and making it their permanent abode. Frontiers of states and the
boundaries of principalities have always posed a challenge to historians and
mapmakers. With the coming of the British colonialists, this huge land area
was minutely surveyed, communities were labeled and counted according to
their religion, and lines were drawn on paper to create maps and in social life
to create new identities.
With formal colonial control gone, the region today consisting of seven
independent states is referred to collectively as South Asia.1 This nomencla-
ture, which owes its origin to international politics, does not find any refer-
ence in historical texts. In the context of this book, my focus is on the region,
identified earlier as the subcontinent of India. This region, known vaguely as
Hindustan in medieval history and in early Sufi traditions, occupies a special
place in the history of Islam and of the Muslim communities for whom it is
their land.
Muslim society in South Asia grew and spread with a variegated pattern
of development. The expansion of the new community, both in number and
influence, similar to the other incoming groups all through history, is a sub-
ject of intense research with a potential of turning into politically motivated
debate among historians and policy-makers and has resulted in a large number
of treatises and monographs.2 A critical exposition of several aspects of the

1 In alphabetical order, these states are Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal,
Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.
2 From among the long list of distinguished and significant works on this theme, I cite only
a few studies here, two studies by Aziz Ahmad, Studies in Islamic Culture in the Indian
Environment. Oxford: Clarendon Press (1964) and Islamic Modernism in India and Pakistan
1857–1964. Oxford: Oxford University Press (1967); M. Mujeeb. The Indian Muslims. London:

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_003

32 Chapter 1

phenomenal growth of Muslims and their effective presence as a dynamic fac-

tor in the social and cultural milieu of South Asia is an ongoing process.
An evaluation of this process, historically as well as in the context of the
present, is crucial to comprehend the salient characteristics of South Asia.
The arrival of the Turko-Afghans in South Asia, within the social context of the
non-Islamic communities who formed the majority of the region’s populace,
is a theme whose several dimensions still await critical analysis. New entrants
and old dwellers met involuntarily, and these unscheduled connections cre-
ated new patterns of living. This pattern of growth is not something peculiar to
South Asia; elsewhere, too, diametrically opposite communities grow, develop,
and flourish and in turn create a mosaic of peoples and cultures. Several stud-
ies, foremost being that which began with Tara Chand, continue to expand,
assess, and examine points of compatibility within the orbit of faith and belief
and daily living, a process which is often defined as synthetization of cultures.3
Military conquests and the arrival of a new cultural or ethnic group, though
two different historical phenomena, have often been used interchangeably
and, in turn, have adversely and negatively influenced the assessment of the
past and the present. Some Muslims scholars of India and Pakistan, for exam-
ple, Saiyyid Sulaiman Nadwī, on the authority of the Traditions of the Prophet,
maintains that Hind and its people were known to the Prophet and the Early
Caliphs.4 Some scholars also argue that the Arab traders and voyagers, because
of their monopoly over the waters of the Indian Ocean, were the first to intro-
duce Islam to the western coastal areas of South India, chiefly Malabar (or
Maʿbār) and Sri Lanka (formerly Ceylon). In some instances, these encounters
resulted in the conversion of the locals to Islam.5 An opposite view, however,

Allen & Unwin, (1967); Muhammad Umar. 2001. Urban Culture in Northern India During the
Eighteenth Century. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal; Murray T. Titus. Islam in India and
Pakistan: A Religious History of Islam in India and Pakistan. Calcutta: Y.M.C.A. Pub. House,
(1959) and Jaʿfar Sharif and G.A. Herklots & W. Crooke. Islam in India, or the Qānūn-i Islām:
The Customs of the Musalmāns of India, Comprising a full and exact account of their vari-
ous rites and Ceremonies from the moment of birth to the hour of death. London: OUP (1921);
Ishtiaq Hussain Qureshi. The Muslim Community of the Indo-Pakistan Subcontinent, 610–1947:
A Brief Historical Analysis. The Hague: Mouton, (1962); Annemarie Schimmel, Islam in the
Indian Subcontinent. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 1980; Barbara D. Metcalf (Edited). Islam
in South Asia in Practice. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, (2009).
3 Tara Chand. 1954. Influence of Islam on Indian culture. Allahabad: Indian Press.
4 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami, on the authority of Nadwī, presents this thesis in his paper, “Early
Arab contact with South Asia.” Journal of Islamic Studies, 5 (1): 52–69, (1994).
5 Ṭuḥfatu’l mujāhidīn, originally written in Arabic by Shaikh Zainu’d-Dīn Mʿābāri, probably in
922/1516, refers to a group of mystics ( fuqarāʾ) who on their way to visit Adam’s footprint
in Ceylon (Sri Lanka), arrived in Cranganore (Kodungallur) on the Malabar coast during
the period of the legendary ruler, Cheraman Perumal. See Tuḥfatu᾽l mujāhidīn by Shaikh
Setting the Scene 33

does exist. Thus, for instance, Nainar refers to a comment of Sulayman al Tajjār,
an Arab maritime trader who in the first half of the ninth century reached the
Gulf of Cambay, that he had never known anyone, either in Hind or China,
who had embraced Islam or anyone who could speak Arabic.6 In 710, the
coastal areas of Makran, Balochistan, and Sindh came under military attacks
led by Muḥammad bin Qāsim. The conquest of this area by 712 resulted in the
introduction of some form of administrative setup under the victorious army
which upheld the local power groups and the prevalent social hierarchy, thus
leaving the system intact.7
Occupation of the Punjab by the Ghaznavids (1001–1186) is marked as the
second arrival of the Muslims. Lahore now emerged as the capital of Muslims
who had entered al-Hind. Muslim scholars and persons of saintly virtues,
known as travellers in search of the Divine, came next. The biggest impetus
to the arrival of the Muslims, however, occurred after a gap of several decades
when the next band of military and political power of the Muslims arrived
from across the mountainous passes of the North. One major push factor for
the coming of Muslims, this time in unprecedented numbers from across the
northern borders into Hindustan, was Mongol brutality in Asia. The newly
formed Delhi Sultanate, in the words of Minhāj Sirāj Juzjāni—who himself
arrived from Ghaur sometime around 1226—offered a safe haven to the émi-
gré and fleeing hordes and attracted Muslims of all stations of life which soon
turned the Sultanate into the orbit of the followers of the faith and the fortress
of Islam.8 Even a quick perusal of history, however, shows a contradictory sce-
nario. Armed conflicts, political tensions, and internal rivalries and feuds, in
addition to the constant fear of inroads by enemy hoards from Central Asia,
seriously jeopardised life. Real and imagined dangers and fears, instead of
decreasing, kept multiplying. Military accomplishments and victories always
posed the problem of consolidation of the conquered land. But land conquest
did not mean the submission of the people.

Zainu’d-Dīn Mʿābāri and translated in Urdu from the original Arabic (992/1584) by Saiyyid
Shamsu’llah Qadiri. Aligarh: Sharwani Printing Press (1942), pp. 13–14.
6 Syed Muhammad Husayn Nainar. 1942. Arab Geographers’ Knowledge of Southern India.
Kerala: Other Books, p. 94.
7 Cultural and social issues that emerged consequent to the conquest of Sindh and the adjoin-
ing areas are assessed by Iqtidar Husain Siddiqui in his Indo-Persian Historiography up to the
Thirteenth Century. (Delhi: Primus Books, 2010), pp. 29–39.
8 The Tabaqaāt-i Nāsiri of Aboo ʿOmar Mināj al-dīn ʿOthman Ibn Sirāj-al-dīn -al-Jawzjāni.
Edited by Captain W. Nassau Lees and Mawlawis Khadim Hosain and ʿAbd-al Ha‌ʾi. Calcutta:
College Press (1864), p. 186.
34 Chapter 1

There are no statistical records to show the number either of incoming

Muslims or of those who chose to stay for good in the new country. However,
court histories, records of military expeditions, revenue deeds, and, more
importantly, birth of new urban centres along with the construction of pal-
aces, mosques, and mausoleums, indicate the presence of a permanent Muslim
community with increasing statistics and growing needs. During this process
of settlement, indigenous people, as individuals and as groups, either accepted
Islam as a personal choice or submitted to temptations and coercion to con-
vert. This new community of Muslims, identified as Indian Muslims, despite
remaining not on par with the incoming Muslims, finally emerged as the base
of the Muslim society of South Asia and enriched it in a variety of ways.
Within this emerging Muslim community of South Asia, women’s presence
remains critically veiled and subordinated to the male presence and male
authority. There is little information about Muslim women who travelled from
outside the geographic confines of Hindustan and came to the new land along
with the male members of their families. While women’s experiences of travel,
settling down in new environs, and their interaction with Hindustan remains
little explored and documented, more is written about their role in adapting
and popularising non-Islamic traditions, and accusing them of promoting
heretical ways. Sporadic references, and not coherent accounts, however, can
be gleaned by scanning the contemporary texts, including travelogues. Built
on these sources, narratives about women’s dress, ornaments they have worn,
and the cosmetics they applied, as seen by men and as inscribed by male writ-
ers, exist. The omission of women’s direct voices has raised little critical schol-
arly inquiry. Similar to the other baggage accompanying the incoming male,
women were also counted, protected, and safeguarded. They were honoured
and respected too. Their identity as an individual person, however, was not
viewed as of any consequence; the family connection was their main identi-
fier. It is expected and hoped that as more studies are undertaken, some of the
hidden or omitted aspects of women’s history would be critically evaluated
and recorded. Of these hidden and omitted areas of research and investiga-
tion, I need not emphasise, is the role of women as constructors of a society
and not as a passive entity. Suppressed and omitted histories are more harmful,
often fatal, for nations. Until women’s written words are discovered, history
would offer only a male vision through male eyes. The following account, thus,
is based on male authorship only.
Amīr Khusraw (1253–1325) enjoyed multiple identities, each of which was
lauded, admired, and loved. This admiration has grown tremendously over the
huge span of centuries. On one hand, he had an insider’s familiarity with court
life and the field experience of a soldier; on the other hand, he was a regular
Setting the Scene 35

visitor of the khānqāh and was the beloved disciple of Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ. He travelled widely in India. He is the first Sufi court poet to write
in his lengthy poem Nuh siphir (the nine heavens, composed in 718/1318)9
that the land of Hindustan is bihisht-i zamīn (heaven on earth). Discarding
the most cherished connections of a Muslim with lands of their past habi-
tat, he declared his pride that Hindustan was his homeland because he was
born and lived there. To convince his audience that his motherland was bet-
ter than Rome, Iraq, Khurasan, and Qandahar, regions embedded in Muslim
émigré groups’ memory as the sacred lands of their glorious past, Khusraw’s
foremost reason was that Hindustan was the sign of heaven (khuld nishāṅ) on
earth. Adam was sent down from heaven to Hind. The peacock, India’s beloved
bird, is a bird of the garden of heaven (bāgh-i falakī).10 ʿAbduʾs Ṣamad bin Afẓal
Aḥmad, a resident of Agra and a nephew and son-in-law of Abu’l Faẓl (assas-
sinated in 1602), Emperor Akbar’s court chronicler, made a fresh argument in
favour of India. Explaining the reasons for compiling the lives of mystics and
Sufis of India in Akhbāru’l Aṣfiyāʾ (which was compiled sometime in the early
years of Emperor Jahangir’s era), he argued that the Muslims loved Hindustan
because a large number of friends of God and God-fearing devout persons
were reposing in their graves in India. To add weight to his argument, ʿAbduʾs
Ṣamad pleaded that the number of such persons in Hind is larger as compared
to any other country.11
Appreciation of the local culture even emerged in the spiritual sessions of
the Sufis. Khwāja Gīsū Darāz (721/1321–825/1422), khalīfa of Shaikh Naṣīru’d-
Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī (1276–1356), in his discourse session held on
19 Ramaẓān 802/1400, expressed his appreciation for the spoken dialects of
the people. Khwāja Gīsū Darāz explained that this language, a mix of Arabic-
Persian with local languages, had softer expressions that touched the heart and
the listener was moved to cry. The Sufis like this quality of the language, he
emphasised.12 Appreciation and adaptation of Hindawi—as this Indian lan-
guage was called to distinguish it from Farsi—led to the mingling of the Indian

9 The time of composition coincides with Khusraw’s period of connections with Khwāja
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ Chishtī.
10 Wahid Mirza. 1949. The Nuh Sipihr of Amir Khusrau. London: Oxford University Press,
especially, pp. 147–211.
11 Shadma Shahzad. 2013. ‘A Critical Edition of Akhbar-ul-Asfiya with Introduction and
Notes.’ A thesis submitted for the award of Doctor of Philosophy in Persian. Department
of Persian, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, p. 84.
12 Muḥammad Akbar Ḥussainī. 2010. Sharaḥ Jawāmiu’l-kilam (malfūzāt of Saiyyid Gīsū
Darāz, compiled by Akbar Ḥusainī. Translated by Wāhid Bakhsh Siyāl Chishtī Ṣābirī).
Lahore: al-Faisal, p. 300.
36 Chapter 1

spiritual idioms at the intellectual level of the South Asian Sufis. Perhaps the
first attempt to bring the two languages closer in order to facilitate commu-
nication and understanding of each other was the composition of Khāliq
bāri. Khāliq bārī, a versified composition, long assumed to be a work of Amīr
Khusraw,13 begins by paying tribute to Allah by saying khāliq bārī sarjan hār,
wāḥid ek badā kartār (there is only God who has created all). In essence, it is a
versified dictionary of words of Farsi and Awadhi for everyday use.14 One of the
earliest examples is Chandāyān, a longer verse on the theme of love and sepa-
ration in Awadhi dialect by Maulānā Da‌ʾūd Awadhi (b. 722/1322), a disciple of
Shaikh Naṣiru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī, composed around 1379.15 Later,
similar efforts were made by Shaikh ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī (d. 456/1537) of
the Ṣabirī-Chishtī Sufi silsila in his Rushd Nāmā (The Book of Correct Conduct)
on the theme of habs-i dam, the practice of breath control in the Sufi and Yogic
philosophies.16A good example of appreciation of local Indian socioreligious
milieu comes from ʿAbdul Wahid Bilgrāmī (1509–1608)17 who in his Ḥaqa‌ʾiq-i
Hindi, a dictionary of Hindi words, expresses his devotion to the Vedic deity
Krishna. Most of the devotional songs that women sang while grinding, known
as chakki-namas, were in this mixed language, using metaphors that were
familiar to women only.18
Similarly, ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī, an employee of the Mughal nobles, with a long
family history of devotion for the Chishtī silsila, in his late seventeenth-century
(1683) Sufi biographical compendium Maʿāriju’l Wilāyat, wrote that the Divine
decree which has appointed human beings as God’s viceregent (khalifa) on
earth also turned Hindustan into rashk-i gulistān (the envy of rose garden) by
placing the blessings of the footsteps of the Sufis of Chisht.19

13 Recent research shows that it was composed by one Ẓiauddin Khusraw in 1031/1622 dur-
ing Jahangir’s era. See Ḥāfiz Maḥmūd Shirīnī. 1944. Ḥifzu’l lisān mʿarūf ba khāliq bārī.
Delhi: Anjuman Tarqqī-yi Urdu.
14 Amīr Khusraw. 1287/1870. Khāliq Bārī Sarjan Hār. Lucknow: Maṭbaʿ Nawal Kishore.
15 Maulānā Da‌ʾūd. 1996. Chandāyān. Edited by Muḥammad Anṣārullah. Patna Tahqīqāt-i
Urdu.
16 S.C.R. Weightman. 1992.‘The text of Alakh Bānī or Rushd Nama of Abdul Quddus
Gangohi.’ In Devotional Literature in South Asia. Current Research, 1985–1988. Edited by
R.S. McGregor. New York: SUNY, pp. 171–78.
17 For his short biography, see ʿAbdu’l Qādir Badaoni. 1284/1867. Muntakhabuʾt tawārīkh.
Lucknow: Maṭbāʿ Khāṣ Munshi Nawal Kishore; Ghulām ʿAli Āzād Bilgrāmī. 1328/1910.
Daftar-i awwal Maʿāsiru’l kirām. Agra: Maṭbaʿ Mufīd-i ʿĀm, pp. 26–33.
18 For further details, see the scholarly exposition of this theme by Richard Eaton in his Sufis
of Bijapur, 1300–1700: Social Roles of Sufi in Medieval India. (Princeton University Press,
1978), pp. 155–165 and “Sufi Folk Literature and the Expansion of Indian Islam.” History of
Religions, 14 (2): 117–127.
19 ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī. Maʿāriju’l Wilāyat (MS no. R344) in the Panjab University (Lahore)
Library, in the collection of Iqbal Mujaddidi, folio 1a.
Setting the Scene 37

Almost a century later, another scholar and Sufi, Ᾱzād Bilgrāmī (1704–1786),
referring to the significance of this region in Muslim memory and citing sev-
eral commentators (mufassirīn) and reporters of the Prophet’s Traditions
(muhaddisīn), writes that this region is sacred because Adam, the first Prophet,
was sent down to Sarandeep,20 thus making the region of Hind the place where
the sun of Prophethood dawned first (ṭulūʿ shams al-nabuwwat awwalan).21
Ᾱzād even declared that “since Adam first landed in India, therefore all his
descendants are Indian.”22After another hundred years, Sayyid Sulaiman Nadwī
(1884–1953), in 1930, a period marked with intense political activity heightened
by nationalism and Indian Muslims’ quest for their identity, endorsed the
above-cited views of Ᾱzād. He further declared that the commonly held view
that Muslim connection with India began following the conquest of Maḥmūd
of Ghazni was erroneous. To support his argument, Nadwī adds a reference to
the Prophets’ Traditions of four rivers that flow out of heaven and comments
that, according to some, the river Ganges or Indus probably is the fourth one
of these.23 Thus, India’s sanctity in Muslim memory is vouched for by their
religious traditions. In the same vein, Muḥammad Ṣādiq Dihlawi Kashmiri
Hamadani, a seventeenth-century Sufi scholar, in his kalimātu’s-ṣādiqīn, which
is an account of the Sufis buried in Delhi up to 1614, writes that to the com-
mon people of Delhi, Delhi was little Makkah, while the elite do not doubt its
greatness.24

20 Sarandeep refers to Sri Lanka.

21 Ᾱzād al-Bilgrāmī. 1884. Subḥat al-marjān fī aṭhar Hindūstān. Bombay: M.S. Maḥmūd,
p. 10. Also see, his Ghazalān-i al-Hind: Muṭālaʿ-yi Hind wa Farsi. Edited by Sirus Shamisa.
Tehran: Sada-yi Maʿāṣir, 1382/1962, p. 25. Also, Lee, Samuel. 1829, Travels of Ibn Batūta.
London: Printed for the Oriental Translation Committee, pp. 183–191. Ibn Batūta describes
in detail his pilgrimage of the footprint of Adam, whom the local people called Adam
Baba and Eve as Mama. See for more details, H.A.R. Gibb (Edited) 1953. Ibn Batuta. Travels
in Asia and Africa 1325–54. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., pp. 255–59.
22 Cited by Carl Ernst. 2011. “Reconfiguring South Asian Islam: From the 18th to the 19th
Century”, Comparative Islamic Studies, 5 (2): 247–272.
23 Saiyyid Sulaiman Nadwī. ʿArab wa Hind kai Taʿalluqāt [Relations between Arabia and
Hind]. Allahabad: Hindustani Academy (1930), pp. 1–5. Nadwī, an eminent researcher-
scholar, was a prolific writer in Urdu and Arabic. His biography of the Prophet, Sīrat-un
Nabī is considered a masterpiece on the Prophet’s life produced in India. Much influenced
by his mentor, Shibli Nuʿmāni (1857–1914), he later founded the Shibli Academy which
spearheaded a new wave of research and publications, particularly in Urdu. Although
Sulaiman Nadwi supported Hindu-Muslim unity in times of deep communal divide, later
in 1950, however, he migrated to Pakistan where he died in 1953 in Karachi.
24 Muḥammad Ṣādiq Dihlawi Kashmiri Hamadani. kalimātu’s-ṣādiqīn. Ed. by Muhammad
Saleem Akhtar. Islamabad: Iran-Pakistan Research Centre, 1988, p. 4.
38 Chapter 1

1.2 Arrival of Sufi Men in South Asia

Information about the chronological order of the arrival of the Sufis is not
definitively known. Similarly, knowledge about the first Sufis to arrive in
India remains incomplete, sparse, and doubtful. There is also still speculation
regarding where in India the first Sufis settled. Mufti Ghulām Sarwar Lahorī,
however, says that Shaikh Muḥammad Ismāʿīl Bukhārī (d. 448/1056) was per-
haps one of the earliest to settle in Lahore during the era of Sultan Masʿūd
Ghaznawi (1031–1041).25 Rizvi places Shaikh Ṣafīu’d-Dīn Kazārūnī as the first
Sufi to settle in Uchch, a city in southern Punjab. According to a hagiographical
anecdote, his uncle, Shaikh Abu Isḥāq Kazārūnī (352/963–426/1033 or 1035)—
celebrated as the guardian saint of sea travellers and voyagers26—ordered him
to mount a camel and travel in whatever direction the animal drove him. He
was to remain where the camel stopped. The camel chose to halt at Uchch.27
Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, in discussing the Sufis of the past in one of his
discourse sessions, mentioned that some of the early Sufis were like birds and
could fly. In this connection, recalling the great miraculous powers of Shaikh
Ṣafīu’d-Dīn Kazārūnī, he narrated that once a yogi, a Hindu mystic expert in
yoga, visited Shaikh Ṣafīu’d-Dīn Kazārūnī at Uchch and started arguing with
him, challenging the Shaikh to compete with him in performing miracles. The
Shaikh told him that he should first display his miraculous powers as he had
come to challenge him [the Shaikh]. The yogi flew from the ground upward till
his head touched the ceiling and then landed again. The Shaikh then looked
towards the heavens and beseeched, “O Lord, you have given this superiority
to this stranger. Grant me some similar miracles (karāmāt).” The Shaikh then
stepped out of his cell, flew to the west [the direction of Makkah], then to the
north and the south, and returned safely to his cell. Watching this, the yogi

25 Ghulām Sarwar Lahorī. 1976. Ḥadīqatʾul Awliyāʾ: Punjāb ke Akābīr Sufīyāʾ kā Mustanad
Tazkira. Lahore: Islamic Book Foundation. (First published in 1875 at Kanpur: Munshi
Nawal Kishore. Henceforth, referred to as Ḥadīqatʾul Awliyāʾ), p. 179.
26 For a short note on Kazārūnī, B. Lawrence, 1983. “ABŪ ESḤĀQ KĀZARŪNĪ,”
Encyclopædia Iranica, I/3, pp. 274–275; Ahmet T. Karamustafa, 2007. Sufism. The Formative
Period. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, pp. 115–16; Ibn Baṭuṭa writes that Shaikh
Abū Isḥāq Kazārūnī was a highly venerated saint in India and China because of the pro-
tection he offered to the sea-farers. Baṭuṭa describes an intricate, but a well-managed sys-
tem of the collection of cash offerings vowed by the sea-traders to the Shaikh Abū Isḥāq’s
shrine managers. Ibn Batuta. Travels in Asia and Africa 1325–54, p. 97.
27 Saiyid Athar Abbas Rizvi. 2004. A History of Sufism in India, vol. 1. Lahore: Suhail Academy,
p. 111.
Setting the Scene 39

admitted that the Shaikh’s powers were true and were from the Divine and that
his own powers were false (bāṭil ast).28
A similar account, though in greater detail, is about Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn
Chishtī of Ajmer (d. 633/1236) in Siyaru’l Aqṭāb of Ilah Diya Chishtī, which was
compiled in 1056/1646–1647. The incredible hagiographical tale of the spiritual
feats of the Khwāja, in the words of Ilah Diya Chishtī, reads like magical stories
in which the right is always the winner at the end.29
This contestation between a Sufi and a yogi, both males, is noticeable in
other spheres where the incoming Muslims and the earlier inhabitants of the
land encountered each other. These encounters appeared in the form of physi-
cal conflicts, resulting in battles, armed clashes, and insurrections. They also
took the form of verbal discords and, much later, sectarian pamphleteering
and tract writings against each other. On the other side, syncretic encounters
and assimilative efforts were also noticeable.30
A large corpus of Sufi treatises and manuals, produced by the most vener-
ated and idolised Sufis, offers lengthy and convincing expositions on Sufis and
Sufism. I begin with Abu’l Ḥasan ʿAlī al-Hujwīrī’s (d. between 465–469/1037–
1077) exposition of the two chief terms: taṣawwuf and Sufis. I selected Hujwīrī
for three reasons: (1) Hujwīrī’s magnum opus treatise, Kashfu’l Maḥjūb
(Uncovering the Veiled), is the first and oldest known work on Sufism in the
Persian (Dari)31 language and it was composed on the soil of the region under
review, i.e., in South Asia in the city of Lahore; (2) the text carries references,
though sparse and brief but significant in terms of implications, to the state of
taṣawwuf and the ways of the Sufis as witnessed by Hujwīrī in eleventh-century
Hind (the term Hujwīrī uses to describe India at that time); and (3) because
of his reflections on women, which are assessed and examined in more detail
elsewhere in this book.
Not much is known about the personal life of the Ghazni-born Hujwīrī
beyond what he occasionally chose to say about himself. We know that Hujwīrī
traversed vast geographies of the Muslim lands, interacted with some of the
most respected centres of the spiritual realm of his day, and studied taṣawwuf

28 FF, Majlis 7, Wednesday, 5 Safar, 710/July 4, 1310. In Fawa‌ʾid al-fuʾād. Compiled by Amīr
Ḥasan ʿAlā Sijzi Dihlawī. Lucknow: Munshi Nawal Kishore (1302/1885). (Henceforth,
referred to as FF).
29 Ilah Diya Chishtī. Risālā Siyaru᾽l Aqṭāb (translated in Urdu by Muḥammad ῾Alī Joyā).
Kanpur: Nawal Kishore, 1906, pp. 123–125.
30 On this theme, see Veronique Bouillier, ‘Nāth Yogīs Encounter with Islam.’ South Asia
Multidisciplinary Academic Journal [Online].
31 Hamid Wahed Alikuzai. 2013. A Concise History of Afghanistan. Vol. 1. [United States],
Trafford Publishing, p. 136.
40 Chapter 1

under scholars such as Abu’l Fazl Muḥammad bin al Ḥasan al-Khuttalī,32 Abu’l
ʿAbbās al-Ashqānī,33 and Abu’l Qāsim Gurgāni.34 Hujwīrī eventually arrived
in Lahore and made the city his abode. In Lahore, he wrote Kashfu᾽l Maḥjūb,
the first and oldest known treatise on Sufism in the Persian language. We have
no documented evidence to know the duration of time spent by Hujwīrī in
Lahore, but it appears he spent enough time there to learn about Lahore and
its people. He also had time to write Kashfu᾽l Maḥjūb and some other texts, one
of which, a book of poetry, was plagiarised by someone. To protect his author-
ship, as copyright laws did not exist then, the only thing that Hujwīrī could do
was to insert his name in several places in the text.35
The arrival of Hujwīrī in Lahore, the reasons for his arrival and stay, and
his reflections on Lahore’s contemporary Muslim society are very relevant
to our discussion here. Hujwīrī was commanded by his Shaikh, Abu’l Fazl
Muḥammad al-Khuttalī, to settle down in Lahore. Because another disciple of
Khuttalī, Shaikh Ḥasan Zanjāni, was already there on the orders of Khuttalī,
Hujwīrī showed his reluctance to travel to Lahore. However, Hujwīrī had to
obey his Shaikh. According to Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, when Hujwīrī
arrived at the gates of Lahore, it was dark and he had to wait until morning to
enter the city. At dawn, when he was about to enter, the bier of Shaikh Ḥasan
Zanjāni was brought out from the same gate.36 Though we do not know when
Hujwīrī commenced writing Kashfu᾽l Maḥjūb, the contents tell us that he had
already spent a fair amount of time getting to know the people of Lahore and

32 Abu’l Fazl al-Khuttalī, a scholar of exegesis and traditions and followed Junaid in Sufi
thoughts, was a student of Abu’l Ḥasan al Ḥusri (d. 371/981–2). He was Hujwīrī’s mentor
from whom he learned the Sufi path (ṭarīqat). Hujwīrī comments that he had never seen
a man of truth revered so much as Khuttalī was. Hujwīrī was so close to Khuttalī that
he would help him in performing ablutions for prayers (waẓū). When Khuttalī passed
away, he rested his head on the bosom of his devoted student, Hujwīrī. The last words
that Khuttalī spoke, while breathing his last, to Hujwīrī and which he remembered while
composing Kashfu᾽l Maḥjūb, were ‘do not quarrel (khusūmat) with God’s doings nor be
saddened in your heart at whatever He does to you.’ See Hujwīrī, pp. 208–9.
33 al-Ashqānī, an exponent of the philosophy of annihilation ( fanāʾ) and an eminent and
illustrious Sufi, was also Hujwīrī’s teacher. Hujwīrī was not happy to see the ignorant
(juhalāʾ)ʾ imitating Ashqānī ecstatic utterances (shaṭḥ). See Hujwīrī, pp. 208–9.
34 Abu’l Qāsim Gurgāni (d. 450 or 469) with whom Hujwīrī had several discourses on a vari-
ety of aspects of Sufi ṭarīqa, and whom he describes as Quṭb-i zamānā (the pole of the
age) and one who was unparalleled and matchless, was a much-respected Sufi of Iranian.
See Hujwīrī, pp. 211–12.
35 Hujwīrī, p. 1; More than four hundred and fifty years later, this incident of theft of Hujwīrī’s
work, appeared in the discourse of Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ in the session held on
Muḥarram 15, 710, FF.
36 FF, Majlis 31, 29 Ziqʿad, 711.
Setting the Scene 41

assessing their ways of life and behaviour. He found the people ill-mannered
and was not happy about his stay there. Indeed, he compared his stay to being
in chains (giriftār).37
Hujwīrī did not leave behind a legacy in terms of disciples or successors.
Perhaps because of this reason, Hujwīrī remains a detached single example of
Sufis who arrived in India and lived or died there. Although no Sufi silsila car-
rying the name of Hujwīrī is known to exist, the number of devotees who seek
his blessings at his sprawled shrine in Lahore is massive.

1.3 Arrival of Sufi Women in South Asia

Stories of the arrival of the Sufis are mainly the stories of the arrival of male
Sufis. Women who travelled with the male Sufis are not identified. We do not
know whether any woman Sufi ever travelled alone. Sufi women’s travel expe-
riences, even in the caravans led and organised by men, are not available. As
a rule, women’s names as individuals are withheld or kept hidden. Amongst
some rare examples is the case of Bībī Sāra, mother of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad (d. 725/1325). Her brother-in-law, Saiyyid Nūru’d-Dīn Mubārak
Ghaznawi (d. 632/1234), a khalīfa of Shaikh Shihābu’d-Dīn Suhrawardī, also
travelled with her to Delhi from Ghazna during the time of Sultan Shamsu’d-
Dīn Iltutmish (r. 1211–1236). While the family of Bībī Sāra was still in Ghazna,
Khwāja Muʿīnu’d-Dīn, who later settled in Ajmer, visited her father-in-law,
Shamsu’l-ʿᾹrifīn ʿAbdu’l Wahīd.38 The family of Bībī Sāra probably moved to
Delhi at the suggestion of Khwāja Muʿīnu’d-Dīn. No contemporary sources
record dates of her arrival or death; however, Ghulam Sarwar Lahori, a late-
nineteenth-century compiler of Sufi biographies, without citing any refer-
ences, gives the year 638/1240 as her date of demise. Early Sufi malfūzāt, for
example, Fawāʾidu’l-fuʾād, refers to her in the story of her son’s charismatic
powers, and that without giving her name.39
Beemā Bīwī, who is lying buried along with her son, Māhīn (or Māhim) Abu’l
Bakr Awliyāʾ Allāh, is regarded as one of the earliest Muslims to arrive in Kerala,
in South India. Although no contemporary record has yet been accessed, she
is commemorated with great devotion by local legends that narrate that this
pious woman was a member of the Prophet’s family and that she, along with

37 Hujwīrī, p. 115.
38 Saiyid Athar Abbas Rizvi. 1978. A History of Sufism in India, vol. 1. Delhi: Munshiram
Manoharlal Publishers, p. 121.
39 FF, Majlis 25, 15th Jamādiu’l awwal, 711/1311.
42 Chapter 1

her son, travelled from Arabia across the Indian Ocean and disembarked on the
shores of Kerala to bless it with her spiritual powers.40A similar story, steeped
in legends and dearly preserved by oral traditions, is about Māʾī Mirāṅ, in the
coastal city of Karachi. According to these legends, Māʾī Mirāṅ and her sister
Māʾī Lānjī arrived together by a boat from across the seas at some unidentified
time. The two sisters are said to be the virgin granddaughters of Shaikh ʿAbdu’l
Qādir Gīlānī. In some other stories, Māʾī Mirāṅ was accompanied by her seven
virgin playmates. Sea voyages of pious women, unaccompanied by males, from
the blessed soils of Arabia and Iraq, their family lineage with the Prophet’s
family, or with the families of venerated persons such as Shaikh ʿAbdu’l Qādir
Gīlānī (d. 1166 in Baghdad), add charisma to the persona of a woman Sufi. It
magnifies her agency beyond a devotee’s imagination. These anecdotes are
centuries old and far more powerful than any other scholarship.
Bībī Rāstī (the righteous one), or Bībī Pākdāman (the chaste lady), the
mother of Shaikh Ruknu’d-Dīn Abu’l Faṭh, known as Shaikh Rukn-i- ʿĀlam
(support of the world) (d. 1335),41 was the daughter of Sulṭān Jamālu’d-Dīn of
Farghana, a state in Central Asia, and came to Hindustan along with her family.
She was married to Makhdūm Shaikh Ṣadru’d-Dīn ʿĀrif Qattāl (d. 1286),42 son
of Shaikhu’l Islam Bahāʾud-Dīn Zakarīyya (d. 1267).43
Although details are lacking, it is known that Ḥaẓrat Bībī Raushan Ārāʾ
(1279–1342), a daughter born to an Indian immigrant family settled in Makka,
travelled in 1321 along with her elder brother, Pīr Saiyyid ʿAbbās ʿAlī, and his
wife to Delhi. Shaikh Ḥasan Shāh, a Qādirī Sufi of Delhi, sent Raushan Ārāʾ
and his brother to Bengal. Bībī Raushan Ārāʾ was a forty-two-year-old, highly
educated woman when she arrived in Delhi. She remained celibate and died
in 1342 at the age of sixty-four and lies buried in her shrine in the village of
Kathulia in Bashirhat at the banks of river Ichhamati.44
According to one popular legend, Ḥaẓrat Mā Ṣāḥiba Ashraf-i do-jahāṇ
(d. 1369) came from Bukhara, now in Central Asia, to Koŕchi, a town on the
banks of river Krishna and known as the land of the Sufis. Local legends say
that subsequent to the death of her husband, Muḥammad Shāh, Ḥaẓrat Mā

40 V.A. Ahmed Kabeer. 1987. Muslim Monuments in Kerala. (Part 1) Trivandrum: Velavoor
Publishing House, p. 198.
41 Jamālī, pp. 140–47; AA gives an account of the excellence of this saint. For details, see,
pp. 65–68.
42 For his biographical notices, see AA, pp. 63–65.
43 For an account of his life, see AA, pp. 30–31.
44 Muhammad Abdur Rahim. 1963. Social and Cultural History of Bengal (1201–1576), Vol. 1,
Karachi: Pakistan Historical Society, p. 126; Muhammad Ismail. 2010. Hagiology of Sufi
Saints and the Spread of Islam in South Asia. New Delhi: Jananada Prakashan, p. 174.
Setting the Scene 43

Ṣāḥiba, along with her brother Hazbaru’d-Dīn Zafar Khan and two young sons,
ʿAlī Shāh and Ḥasan Shāh, came to Multan, which almost ranked as the first
stop for the incoming travellers from across the borders. Karanataka State
Gazette, however, says that she came from Arabia or Baghdad.45 She was the
mother of ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn Ḥasan Gangū, the founding Sulṭān of the Bahmani king-
dom of the Deccan (1347–1358).
Centuries later, we have on record information about the arrival of the
mother of Khwāja Bāqī Billah (d. 1012/1603) of the Naqshbandī Sufi silsila in
Hindustan. Though not much has been written about this pious God-fearing
Sufi woman, fragmented sources show that she belonged to the family of Sufis
and scholars. Her father, Shaikh ʿUmar Yaghestani, was the maternal grand-
father of Khwāja Ubaidullah Aḥrār (d. 855/1490) of the Naqshbandī Sufi sil-
sila. Travelling with her son, Khwāja Bāqī Billah, she left Kabul for Lahore and
finally in 1599 made Delhi her final home.
The above accounts are mostly incidental references about women and
are part of the main accounts of the male Sufis. Of those whose narratives
are included in this book, most were born and raised in this region. There are
several instances when women travelled from northern parts of Hindustan,
Delhi, Lahore, and Multan to South India, known as the Deccan. In terms of
mileage, travel hazards, and encounters with a different cultural and physical
environment was more vivid, and challenging as well, compared to the travel
routes between Afghanistan and the Central Asian regions, from where early
Sufis arrived in India. Throughout the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, travel
along these routes was hazardous because of the general prevalent chaos.
In the wake of the transfer of the capital from Delhi to Deogir (Devgiri) in
the Deccan, migration from Delhi to the Deccan and later to Gujarat began.
Women also travelled to the Deccan, some alone, others with their families. An
earlier example of this inland travel (inland in the sense of these areas falling
within the subcontinent’s territory) is the arrival of Bībī ʿĀʾisha, assumed to be
a widowed daughter of Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar, along with her unmarried,
early teenaged daughter. What led her to undertake this journey? Was she, like
her contemporary male Sufis, inspired to introduce the Sufi message in the
Deccan? How did she support herself and her daughter there? We have a whole
set of questions that remain unanswered. Indeed, one unanswered question in
turn creates more complex questions. Similarly, Bībī Ḥājara, the mother of the
Chishtī saints Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb (d. 1337) and Muntajibu’d-Dīn (d. 1309),
travelled from Delhi to Khuldābād along with her family of five daughters—Bībī

45 Suryanath U. Kamath. Karnataka State Gazetteer: Belgaum. (Bangalore: Government

Press, 1987). p. 912.
44 Chapter 1

Khadīja, Bībī ʿAʾisha, Bībī Maryam, Bībī Ᾱmna, and Bībī Ḥamīda, as well as a
grandson and her brother.46 We assume that Bībī Ḥājara was advanced in her
age at this time. However, old age did not dampen her spirits and she steadily
managed the long travel between Delhi and Khuldabad. Her tomb, next to the
shrine of her son Muntajibu’d-Dīn Zar Zari Zar-Bakhsh in Khuldabad, is visited
by women.
Travel stories of Sufi women are hard to locate. When they do someday
emerge, they would certainly add a fascinating chapter to travel literature,
unveiling several aspects of women and gender history.

1.4 What Is Sufism?

Behold! Verily on the friends (Awliyāʾ) of Allāh there is no fear, nor shall
they grieve.
Qurʾān (10:62)

Hadith-i qudsi: “Verily my saints are under my domes, and only I know
them.”47

The question “what is Sufism?” sounds like a unit of a teaching course on Islam
or Islamic mysticism. However, in view of the ongoing debate on the origin
and genesis of the term Sufi and its Western derivative, Sufism, I find myself
compelled to answer the question briefly. In recapping this debate, my pur-
pose here is not merely to follow the norm of most of the academic theses
produced on the topics of Sufism; I seek to investigate the presence of women,
as individuals and as a community, in this never-ending repetitive discourse.
Within this context, all the questions that stimulated this work emerged from
one single query: what does Sufism stand for? Embedded in this basic query
are questions such as, how does one define and recognise a Sufi? Are there or
should there be visible signs and markers of knowing or identifying a Sufi? Are
Sufis males only? Can women be Sufis as well? I would address these issues
briefly here; more reflections and relevant details on this theme emerge as the
present work develops in the pages that follow.

46 Rawnaq ʿAlī, 1326/1908. Rawẓatu’l-aqṭāb al-mʿarūf ba Mazhar-i Āṣafi. Aurangābād: Maṭbaʿ

Muʿīn-i Deccan, p. 43; Muḥammad Wāḥid Khān. 1913. Chār Chaman Khuldābād Sharīf ma‌ʾ
naqshājāt. Maṭbaʿ Abu’lʿalāiʾHyderabad, Deccan, p. 3.
47 Cited in Annemarie Schimmel. 1975. Mystical Dimensions of Islam. Chapel Hill: North
Carolina Press, p. 203. Hadith-i qudsi are the sayings of the Prophet revealed by God but
phrased by the Prophet.
Setting the Scene 45

In this chapter, a brief conceptualisation of the two core words, i.e., Sufis and
Sufism, is presented. Both words are derived from the concept of taṣawwuf, an
Arabic word of much wider and deeper meaning. The terms Sufi and taṣawwuf
are rooted in the Arabic language in which the word ṣūf means wool, fleece, or
goat’s hair. As some early mystics and renunciants (zāhid), wandering and cave-
dwelling pietists (ʿābid, nāsik), wore garments made of wool and, therefore,
according to the rules of Arabic lexicography, they came to be called wearers of
wool. Among women, fewer are reported to have worn this dress. It also could
also be that fewer women wandered around or lived in caves. They did so, not
because of any lack of piety (zuhd) or the fear of God (taqwā); they preferred
not to reveal and parade their love (ḥub) because of their trust in Him (“For
Allāh loves those who put their trust [in Him]” Qurʾān, sura: āl ʿimrān 3:159).
For Muslim scholars, jurists, and reformers, taṣawwuf, an Arabic term which
could be considered closest to the Western term mysticism, in its essence is the
way to live in accordance with the guidance of the Qurʾān and the Sunna of the
Prophet. Thus, taṣawwuf is not a movement that began at some point in time
and rallied around adherents and supporters. Also, the much-discussed debate
over donning of woollen garments or of sitting on a raised platform or even
becoming a disciple by taking the oath of initiation at the hands of Shaikh,
is a product of discourse that prefers outer symbols to intrinsic values. An
emphasis on wearing of a particular dress or other accessories is regimentalis-
ing friends of God into some sort of brigades. Further, this could be interpreted
as changing the meanings of taṣawwuf from its esoteric/inward (bāṭin) dimen-
sions to external forms (zāhir) which are ever-changing and are distant from
the Truth (ḥaqīqat), which is eternally formless and hence genderless.48 Some
confusion regarding Sufis and Sufism began to grow when Islam and Muslims
were increasingly viewed as adversaries of the Western world. Orientalism, a
by-product of colonialism, though not the creator of the term Sufism, however,
heavily propagated Sufism as an offshoot doctrine of Islam which then was
accused of promoting war and not peace. William Nassau Lees (1825–1889) was
a British Orientalist who worked for some years as Principal of the Calcutta
Madrasa in Bengal, the English-occupied region in India, and edited and pub-
lished several medieval Persian texts. He believed that “all mysticism appears
absurd, but the mysticism of the Çoofis [Sufis] is absurd, is peculiarly a disease,
and, apparently, an infectious and very dangerous one, for it attacks the noblest

48 Titus Burckhardt’s Introduction to the Sufi Doctrine (Bloomington, Ind: World Wisdom,
2008) provides a good understanding of Islam and the Sufi doctrines. For sources in Urdu,
Qurʾān aur taṣawwuf by Mir Valiuddin (Delhi: Nadwatu’l Musannifīn, 1979) offers a logical
and lucid discussion on the theme.
46 Chapter 1

part of man’s nature and frequently destroys it.” About the mysticism of the
East, which he found “filled with useless visions,” he felt that it “destroyed the
vitality of the Muhammedan race and was most mischievous in its results.”49
Thus, Sufis and Sufism (taṣawwuf) are words that carry several connota-
tions, religious, social, and even political. The meanings and precepts of the
two terms, however, become simpler when used in everyday conversations in
South Asia, by nonacademics and those with little formal schooling. For an
ordinary Muslim, irrespective of the gendered nature of the society, a Sufi is a
person least disturbed by worldly attractions and who has more fear of Allāh
than of anyone holding power and authority in this world. Thus, often in every-
day conversation, these individuals, with few or no pretensions, are referred
to as Allāh waley or Allāh ke bandey (men/women of Allāh or the followers of
Allāh). These two popular terms in the vernacular are close to the Qurʾānic
concept of Awliyāʾ Allāh (friends of Allāh). The educated and the scholarly,
both among religionists and secularists, enter into debates and arguments
which have more to do with gaining worldly power and prestige; the love of
Allāh and for His creations has little place in such debates. These debates are
more tuned to the outward symbols, forms, dress, and occupations and less to
matters of the heart.
Leaving this debate aside, I would now look at the definition and concept
of mysticism and taṣawwuf of the Sufis as given by some of the most eminent
and distinguished Sufi Shaikhs and religious scholars (ʿulamāʾ). As a first note
of clarification, before this discussion begins, Islamic mysticism/Sufism is a
way of life rooted in Islam, and is the way of the Prophet and of his Blessed
Companions.50As the text of this volume progresses further, and as we read the
biographies of women in Part 2 of this book, we would consider the key ques-
tion that runs through the entire book: do we find the Sufi practices and beliefs
in line with the precepts of the Qurʾān and the Prophet’s Traditions, or is there
an incongruence between the two? This assessment is of critical relevance not
only to our understanding of the life and experiences of pious women but also
to our understanding of the concept of gender equity. Taṣawwuf, literally—
grammatically as well as conceptually—is a gender-free word referring to a
gender-free way of devotional contemplation. However, the term Sufi, mean-
ing a follower or a practioner of taṣawwuf, traditionally connotes a male image
first. This male image of a Sufi with emphasis on outer symbols such as donning

49 W. Nassu Lees. 1859. The Lives of the Mystics of the East. Biographical Sketch of the Mystic
Philosopher Poet Jami. Calcutta, pp. 17–18.
50 William Chittick. 1992. “The Way of the Sufi.” Sufi,14: pp. 5–10.
Setting the Scene 47

of a particular dress or shaving of the head (maḥlūq) is not in consonance with

the Qurʾān.
It is interesting to note that a similar query, but in greater details and at the
same time reflecting the questioners’ comprehension of Sufism, was raised in
the eleventh century in Lahore when the Muslim community was in its ini-
tial stages of germination. The question was superbly answered by none other
than Abu’l Ḥasan ʿAlī ibn ʿUsmān al-Ghaznawī Jullābī al-Hujwīrī (d. between
465–469/1037–1077),51 a newcomer to the city of Lahore who later died there
and now rules the hearts of the people as Dātā Ganjbkahsh (one who bestows
treasures). Because this question and the response to it could stand as a pro-
logue to any thesis on taṣawwuf (which it did in the case of Kashfu’l-Mahjūb),52
I would quote the whole question here. A person named Abu Saʿīd al-Hujwīrī,
whose background is not told by Hujwīrī, asked him the following question,
which on closer study consists of at least eleven in-depth queries. He asked,

Explain to me the reality of the spiritual Path (ṭarīqat) and of Sufism

(taṣawwuf ); details of its Stations (maqāmāt); elucidate its doctrines
(mazāhib) and discourses (maqalāt); illuminate the mystical allego-
ries and their symbols; what is the nature of Divine Love (muḥabbat-i
khudāwand); how is it manifested in [human] hearts; what causes veiling
of the intellects (sabab ḥijāb-i ʿaqūl) to understand its Essence and why
the soul recoils from it; why the Spirit is lulled in its purity and choices;
and finally, what is the connection between these and the above matters
(muʿmalāt) [the above asked questions].53

Hujwīrī’s answer to these questions is spread over the whole of his treatise;
however, here I would select only those responses that are relevant to the situ-
ation of South Asia. His first response was that during this time (the time of
the composition of Kashfu’l Mahjūb), the science of Sufism was obsolete (īn

51 For Hujwīrī’s biography, Muhammad Dārā Shikūh.1269/1853. Safīnatu’l-awliyāʾ (Litho-

graph text). Agra: Matbaʿ-yi Madrasa Agra, pp. 281–83. Dārā Shikūh introduces him as
Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Pīr ʿAlī Hujwīrī; ʿAbdur Raḥman Jāmī in Nafaḥāt al-uns has a brief notice
on Hujwīrī but does not give any dates, either about Hujwīrī’s birth or demise. See ʿAbdur
Raḥman Jāmī (Edited and translated by W. Nassau Lees). 1858. Nafaḥāt al-uns. Calcutta:
Maṭba Lissī, pp. 358–59. For a more comprehensive biography, see Reynold Alleyne
Nicholson’s Preface in his The Kashf al-Mahjūb: the oldest Persian treatise on Sufism
by Alī B. Uthmān al-Jullābi al- Hujwīrī (London: Luzac, 1911), pp. xvi–xxiv. (Henceforth,
referred to as Nicholson).
52 Abu’l Ḥasan Sayyid Ali b. Usman Hujwīrī Ghaznawi. 2007. Kashfu’l-Mahjūb (nuskhā-yi
Samarqand). Lahore: Sang-e Meel Publications. (Henceforth, referred to as Hujwīrī).
53 Hujwīrī, pp. 10–11.
48 Chapter 1

zamānā īn ʿilm bā-ḥaqīqat maundaris gasht), particularly in Hindustan (khāṣa

īn dayār). Ordinary people as well as the scholars have lost their understanding
of the true essence of taṣawwuf, he lamented.
Serving as both a manual on taṣawwuf and a biographical compendium
of Sufi masters, the whole text of Kashfu᾽l Mahjūb was explicitly composed,
Hujwīrī explains, for the polishers of hearts (siqāl-i dilha), which he thought
were clouded by lack of knowledge (ḥijāb-i ghain giriftār bashand) but still had
the Light of Truth (nūr-i ḥaqq). He hoped that the blessings caused by reading
this book would lift the veil and the readers might “find their way to spirituality
(niʿmat-i ʿirfān).” These readers, which he did not specify, were definitely male
readers as Hujwīrī entertained a low opinion about women and was convinced
that women are chaos creators.
However, it is in chapter three of his book that Hujwīrī explicates the true
meanings and concepts of taṣawwuf. At the very beginning of this chapter,
Hujwīrī refers to various prevalent reasons for the usage of the term Sufi,
and admits that though “the true meaning of this term [taṣawwuf] has been
much discussed and several books have been composed on the subject,” he
was constrained to comment that in his time, “God has veiled most people
from Sufism and from its votaries, and has concealed its mysteries from their
hearts.”54 This has led many to believe erroneously, as he further argued, that
it “consists merely in outward piety without inward contemplation, and oth-
ers suppose that it is a form and a system without essence and root, to such
an extent that they have adopted the view of scoffers (ahl-i hazl) and theo-
logians (ʿulamāʾ) who regard only the external, and have condemned Sufism
altogether, making no attempt to discover what it really is.”55 Such misunder-
standing of taṣawwuf led to the creation of false Sufis whom Hujwīrī refers to
as babblers (arbābu’l lisān).56
To supplement and strengthen his argument, Hujwīrī cites Abu’l Ḥasan Nūrī
(d. 295/907–908),57 who categorically declared that taṣawwuf does not con-
sist of practices and sciences (rusūm wa ʿulūm nīst), but morals (akhlāq). To

54 It is important to note here that Hujwīrī has not used the term Sufism. Instead of what
Nicholson has translated as ‘Sufism’, Hujwīrī refers to it by using a pronoun, i.e., ahl-i īṅ
(people of this [group, i.e., taṣawwuf]. Nicholson, pp. 30–3.
55 Here, in these lines, Hujwīrī’s Farsi text has not used the word Sufism. Further, in the
original text, Hujwīrī uses the term ʿulamāʾ-yi zāhir to make a distinction from scholars
who have a holistic understanding.
56 Hujwīrī, p. 21.
57 Baghdad born Abu’l Ḥasan Nūri was one of the most known Sufis of the ʿAbbāsid era. He
went through several oppositions at the hands of the traditionalists. For his brief biog-
raphy, Nicholson, pp. 130–32; also, Ahmet T. Karamustafa, Sufism. The Formative Period.
(Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press,2007), pp. 11–15.
Setting the Scene 49

clarify his concept, Nūrī said, “practices are rituals created by certain motives
and intents and have no reality. On the contrary, morals are praiseworthy
actions.” Hujwīrī also quotes Murtaʿīsh (d. 328/939–940),58 who emphasised
that taṣawwuf indeed is ḥusnu’l khulq (good disposition). Good disposition,
Murtaʿīsh said, is acquired by doing three things: first, submitting to Allāh’s
commandments (amr-i ḥaqq) without any hypocrisy; second, doing good
things for the people (khalq); and third, doing good towards oneself, by not
following desires and Satan.59
A Ḥadīth, believed to be a Ḥadīth-i Qudsi, describes a Sufi in the following
words:

[God said] “The most blessed of My Friends (aghbaṭ awliya‌ʾ-i ʿind-ī) is a

man of faith who has but few possessions [khafīf al-ḥādh] and delights in
prayer, who performs the service of his Lord, and obeys Him in secret. He
is concealed (ghāmiḍ) among men; they do not point to him with their
fingers. His sustenance is (just) sufficient, and he is content with that.”
Then he [Muḥammad] shook his finger and said: “His death is hastened,
he is not wept over much, and the legacy (turāth) is small.”60

These saints (awliyāʾ), explains Hujwīrī, function as governors of God’s king-

dom; they have ceased their sensual affections. Through the blessing of their
arrival (ba barkat-i iqdām) the rain falls from heaven, and through the purity of
their lives the vegetation springs up from the earth, and through their spiritual
influence the Muslims gain victories over the unbelievers (kāfirān).61
In contrast to the above definition of the Sufis, abundant examples exist of
those who, led by human weaknesses, pretended to be Sufis. Presence of fake
Sufis as compared to the real ones has remained a major social and religious
challenge for the Muslim society all through its existence. Abū Naṣr al-Sarrāj,
a Khurasānī of Ṭūs (d. 378/988)62 attempted to distinguish between the two in
his Arabic-language treatise Kitāb-al-lumaʿ fi’l-tasṣawwuf (The Book of Light

58 Abu Muḥammad ʿAbdu’llah ibn Muḥammad Murtaʿīsh was from Nishapur and died in
Baghdad. For more on Murtaʿīsh, see Hujwīrī, pp. 33–34.
59 Hujwīrī, p. 8; Nicholson, p. 42.
60 Masnad v, 252 and 255. Tirmidhi, 34:35:1, quoted in William A. Graham.1977. Divine Word
and Prophetic Word in Early Islam. The Hague: Mouton, p. 121; Gerlad T. Elmore.1999.
Islamic Sainthood in the Fullness of Time-Ibn al-ʿArabī’s Book of the Fabulous Gryphon.
Leiden: Brill, p. 128.
61 Hujwīrī, p. 262; Nicholson, p. 213.
62 For a short notice on al-Sarrāj, Hujwīrī, p. 262.
50 Chapter 1

Flashes on Sufism), in which he lists about two hundred names of Sufis.63

Al-Sarrāj explains the basic tenets and various stages of taṣawwuf a follower
goes through in search of the ultimate Reality (ḥaqīqā). Addressing the sensible
(ʿāqil), al-Sarrāj explains the nature of the Sufi maxims with reference to their
unique linguistic expressions, mystical terminologies, and codes of behaviour
and living. One can only surmise from al Sarrāj’s warning that the insensible
ones were easily trapped by fake Sufis, even as early as the tenth century. He
warned, “Some knowledge of the principles, aims, and method of genuine
Sūfīs is necessary in this age, in order that they may be distinguished from the
impostors who appropriate their name and dress.”64 The real Sufis, he says, are
those who “agree with the Traditionalists and jurists in their beliefs and accept
their sciences and consult them in difficult matters of religious law. Should
there be differences of opinion, the Ṣūfīs always adopt the principle of follow-
ing the strictest and most perfect course; they venerate the commandments of
God and do not seek to evade them.” In their everyday life, “the Ṣūfīs renounce
what does not concern them, i.e., everything that hinders them from attaining
the object of their quest, which is God only.”65 Simplifying Sarrāj’s commentary
on Sufism, Nicholson observes that Sarrāj shows his acceptance for the deriva-
tion of Sufism from ṣūf but “differs from the ordinary Moslems only in laying
greater stress upon the inward religious life of which the formal acts of worship
are an outward expression.”66 It is significant to note here that persons who
strive to live with love, patience, trust, and abstinence are found in all faiths.
The Yogis of India, the Bhikshus of the Buddhist community, and the Christian
monks are people who individually and collectively have left behind a legacy
that is now a source of inspiration as well as a theme of research.
The Sufi perception of the physical and the spiritual world rests in the
essence of Islam. Since the growth of Islam, the large presence of Sufis in
varying environs and societies and their devotion for Allāh and love for the
Prophet has led some to an erroneous understanding of mixing taṣawwuf with
the veneration of the Sufis. Goldziher rightly defines this veneration as a “cult,”
which is “essentially non-Arab and extra Islamic” and “not truly Qurʾānic.”67
Goldziher simplifies Sufi traits by saying that “saintly men and women, who,

63 Abū Naṣr al-Sarrāj and Reynold A. Nicholson. The Kitáb al-Lumaʿ Fi ‘l-Taṣawwuf of Abū
Naṣr ʿAbdallah B. ʿAlī Al-Sarrāj Al-Ṭūsí. London: Luzac, 1963 (first published in Leyden,
London E.J. Brill/ Luzac & Co. 1914).
64 Ibid, p. 2.
65 Ibid, p. 4.
66 Ibid, p. ix, x.
67 Ignaz Goldziher, C. Renate Barber, and Samuel Miklos Stern. 1971. Muslim Studies
(Muhammedanische Studien) Vol. 2. London: Allen and Unwin, p. 258.
Setting the Scene 51

by their endeavour to renounce worldly goods, to live for God’s sake and give
willingly their lives as martyrs for Him and rise above the masses” are “objects
of admiration” and that “the Qurʾān itself mentions them and prefers them to
all others.”68
In the first Assembly of Fawa‌ʾid al-fuʾād, Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ
(d. 725/1325), opens his discourse with a discussion on the traits of men of Allāh
(mardān-i khudā) who keep themselves concealed (poshīdā dāshtand); God
reveals them. He further elucidates that perfection of men (kamāl-i mard) is
achieved by eating, talking, sleeping, and socialising little. Rejection of world-
liness (tark-i dunyā) and voluntarily giving up all worldly possessions for an
unconditional love of the Divine is the core of the mystics’ way of life. Ḥaẓrat
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, affectionately and reverently addressed as Sulṭānu’l
Mashāʾikh (the Sultan of all the Shaikhs), explains that rejection of worldly
attractions and possessions does not entail that “one should give up clothing,
tie a loincloth, and retire to a corner. Renunciation means that one should
dress, eat, and whatever comes as an earning, is not hoarded; one has neither
an attachment for it nor the heart is not inclined towards anything.”69
At the same time, reading the Sufi texts, one begins to form a picture of
the Sufis which contradicts the above definition of a Sufi by Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ, managing and guarding their territorial jurisdictions, similar to a well-
administered state, with a band of loyal, trained, and skilled lieutenants, the
khalīfas, who worked under a code of conduct or ādāb, similar in essence to
the laws of ruling (āʾīn jahāṅdārī). I refrain from further discussion on this, as
it would make my text voluminous and shift the focus of my study from the
lives of Sufi women. Therefore, in the following chapter I look at the Sufi texts
to explore the perception of women.
68 Ibid, p. 259.
69 FF, Majlis 1, Shʿabān 707/1308.
 Chapter 2

The Sufi Texts: From Imagination to the

Inscribed Word

2.1 The Genre of Hagiography

Hagiography is as old as religion is. Often the task of segregating the funda-
mentals of a religion from its hagiography becomes a challenging undertaking.
Complex in its making and doubtful in its contents, however, it is arduous and
problematical to discard hagiographical narratives completely. Hagiography
indeed has added colour, vibrancy, and fairy tale–like imagery to the com-
pletely sober-looking landscape of the universe of the mystics, ascetics, and
Sufis. Even cursory glances over the hagiographical texts show that they do not
always represent what the historic facts or the personages were; they depict
what the scribe imagined them to be and what the audiences relished, and of
course, in some cases, what the central character wished to be known about
him. Indeed, even the court histories and panegyric portrayals of the rulers
are no less than the hagiographies in their contents, intents, and effects. Thus,
hagiographical sketches of heroes and leaders do not depict what the person
was in real life; these are imagined histories and are a subtle combination of
the cumulative memory of the people and the craft of penmanship.
Most historical research includes hagiographical accounts and thus is
inspired and guided by imagination, desire, dreams, and aspirations. The
charm of listening to or reading hagiographies often transports audiences to a
magical world, away from the demands of routine life. Another significant role
that hagiography continues to play is that through it the voices of the Sufis,
though dead centuries back, remain in communication with their followers
and devotees, thus lending strong support to debates between traditions and
facts and between pristine religion and popular religion. The hagiography of
the eleventh-century martyred holy warrior Saiyyid Salār Masʿūd Ghāzī of
Makanpur near Bahraich (UP, India) best illustrates how hagiographies are
created, maintained, and endorsed. When ʿAbduʾr Raḥmān Chishtī, a Sufi
scholar of the seventeenth century, wove the legend of Saiyyid Salār Masʿūd
Ghāzī (d. 1034) in his Sufi biography Mirāt-i Masʿūdī (the mirror of Masʿūd),
he would often seek explanations in his dreams from personalities deceased
centuries back whenever he experienced difficulty either interpreting events

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_004

The Sufi Texts 53

as he perceived them or discerning the sequence of events.1 This peculiar

methodology uplifted Mirāt-i Masʿūdī in his readers’ estimation to sublime
heights. The legendry tales of the exploits and particularly the marriage of
Saiyyid Salār Masʿūd Ghāzī—affectionately embedded in public memory,
irrespective of class, ethnicity, or religious divides as Ghāzī Miyān (the win-
ning warrior) and Ganjan Dulha (the warrior bridegroom)—however, are
preserved more by oral traditions than by the text and are enacted at annual
public fairs held on the ʿurs (death anniversary) of Ghāzī Miyān. On the occa-
sion of his ʿurs, the annual fair held in Makanpur and elsewhere, local singers
recreate hagiography through bardic tales.2 Interestingly, this sacred hagiog-
raphy, memorialised by oral traditions, was outright rejected and denounced
by a late-nineteenth-century American Presbyterian missionary, Mrs. John
Forman, as a “lie,” the fair as a “piteous sight,” and the participant’s behaviour
as “monstrosity.”3 Hagiographies, thus, are part of community identity, often
contested by the “other.”
Hundreds of printed versions of these hagiographies, costing little, and
now downloadable online for free, cater to the needs of a growing audience.
Interestingly, these Sufi hagiographies have gained recognition as primary
sources as more and more academic researchers have begun to study them and
cite these works in their texts. Some of the sources examined in this work—
written mostly in Persian, barring a few in Arabic—were all penned within the
cultural landscape of Hindustan by male writers, some of whom were recent
arrivals in India, and thus these writings reflect a synthesis of the local with
the world outside through the male gaze. Hagiographic literature is centred
less on Sufi women, as compared to the voluminous ones about male Sufis.
One reason for this disparity is the traditional evasion of public discourse on
and about women. Any public discourse related to women is a breach of good

1 ʿAbduʾr Raḥmān Chishtī, 2011. Mirāt-i Madārī. Sidharathnagar: al-majmā῾ (Urdu translation);
Maulawī Saiyyid Muḥammad. Amīr Ḥasan Madārī, 1315/1898. Tazkiratu’l Muttāqīn fi aḥwāl
khulafāʾ Saiyyid Badīʿu’d-Dīn. Kanpur: Maṭbaʿ ʿAzīzī. For Saiyyid Salār Masʿūd Ghāzī’s hagiog-
raphy, see Shahid Amin. 2015. Conquest and community: The Afterlife of Warrior Saint Ghazi
Miyan. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
2 Richard Carnac Temple. 1988. ‘The Marriage of Ghāzi Salār,’ in his The Legends of the Panjab.
Patiala: Language Department. (pp. 98–120). (First published in 1884); Ute Falasch. 2016.
‘Negotiating Religious Authority at a Shrine Inhabited by a Living Saint. The dargāh of
“Zinda” Shāh Madār.’ In Devotional Islam in Contemporary South Asia: Shrines, Journeys and
Wanderers. Ed. by Michel Boivin and Remy Delage. London: Routledge 2016, pp. 63–78.
3 Mrs. John Forman of Futtehgurh. 1899. ‘A Saint’s Tomb’. In Woman’s Work for Woman, July 1899,
p. 195. She was the wife of Revd. Dr. Henry Forman, the in charge of the Futtehgurh Station of
the American Presbyterian Mission.
54 Chapter 2

manners (ādāb); however, there exists a flow of literary compositions describ-

ing women’s physicality in the basest graphic lexis.
Another classic example is the production of Ḥaqīqat-i Gulzār-i Ṣābirī
(1856)4 and Tawārīkh āʿina-yi taṣawwuf (1896),5 two hagiographic Sufi texts in
Urdu by Shāh Muḥammad Ḥasan Ṣābirī Chishtī Rampurī. In each of his intro-
ductions to his books, Shāh Muḥammad Ḥasan explains that the genre of Sufi
writing is of two kinds, based on its sources. One source is exoteric (zāhirī), and
the other is esoteric (bāṭinī). Thus, the two works draw inspiration and facts
from the manifest and hidden knowledge which the author claims are acces-
sible and known to a gnostic (ʿārif). One such esoteric source, the main source
referred to in the two hagiographies, is Zihrat nama (annals of the families),
which Muḥammad Ḥasan Ṣābirī ascribes to Muḥammad Abu’l Qāsīm Gurgānī,
born in Madina in the third year of Hijrī and died in 1165/1751–1752 at the age
of 1,162 years. The Zihrat nama, Ṣābirī claims, was authored by Gurgānī sitting
atop the mountain of Tibet. This esoteric knowledge, Ṣābirī explains, is pre-
served by the families of the gnostic absolved of any authorization (khāndān-i
ʿirfān-i marfūʿl-ijāzat).6 Despite the obvious incredible treatment of history,
both the works have retained fairly good readership, a fact supported by the
appearance of the 1986 edition of Ḥaqīqat-i Gulzār-i Ṣābirī. As most hagiog-
raphies are purposed to sanctify and consecrate a Sufi, and subsequently to
expand the number of his devotees and followers, no such texts glorifying a
female Sufi were produced. In the hagiographical accounts of the male Sufis,
some sparse references do, however, exist commemorating charismatic feats
of mystic women.

2.2 From the Spoken to the Written Word

The Sufi textual sources, other than the pure hagiographies, fall into four
major categories: (1) malfūz (pl. malfūzāt), the discourses of the pious and
holy persons; (2) sira (pl. siyar), biographies of pious persons; (3) tazkira (pl.
tazkirāt), ṭabaqāt, and manāqib, which are records and accounts of the mar-
vellous deeds of the Sufis; and (4) letters of the Sufis maktūb (pl. maktūbāt).
Hagiographic elements, however, are interspersed in all these works as well.

4 Shāh Muḥammad Ḥasan Ṣābirī Chishtī Rampurī. 1304/1856. Ḥaqīqat-i Gulzār-i Ṣābiri.
Rampur: Ḥasani Press (I have used its 6th edition (1983), Maktabā-yi Ṣābriyā, Qasur).
5 Shāh Muḥammad Ḥasan Ṣābirī Chishtī Rampurī. 1311/ 1893. Tawārīkh āʿina-yi taṣawwuf.
Rampur: Ḥasani Press.
6 Ibid, pp. 11–12.
The Sufi Texts 55

Before we look further into these categories, I must reiterate that all these
hitherto known works carried the male voices, were authored by male scribes
about male Sufis, and primarily were for a male audience. The language, idioms,
and expressions—indeed the whole literary setting of these texts—not only
bespeak male supremacy but count women as lower and defective creatures.
The physical space where the words of these texts originated were male spaces,
in terms of their occupancy, control, and management. Any argument pleading
that one cannot or should not look at the past through a modernist lens with
a humanist angle, particularly a feminist lens (or, to use a milder term, gender
equity lens), or apply the principle of fair play and balance (ʿadl wa tawāzun),
does not make a convincing argument. Contrary to the basics of the concept
of taṣawwuf—which is the spirit of the Sufi message and which is manifested
by a loving God via loving His creation, which includes women—most of these
texts reflect a derogatory estimation of women. Indeed, these texts profess that
God sent down, along with the perfect man, a deficient object in the person
of a woman. The contents of these texts, in most instances, are marked with
instructions to pious and virtuous men to guide and teach women to follow
their path of spirituality within the confines of their social order which, by
all definitions, were prone to male egotism. As the volume of this category of
Sufi literature is vast, this section looks only at the nature of these sources and
does not present an assessment of all the texts. Works with relevance to Sufi
women, however, are selected for analysis with references to other texts when-
ever required and appropriate.7

2.3 The Sufi Malfūzāt

Of these Sufi texts, malfūzāt form the most important and engaging source
of information about an individual Sufi, his followers, and his surround-
ings. Being predominantly a discourse led by a saintly male and held within
the precincts marked as sanctified thresholds—the jamāʿat-khānās or the
khānqāhs—and in the presence of a male audience with variant levels of intel-
lect, perceptions, and mental training, malfūzāt technically fall in the category
of oral history, because these are not first-person accounts but instead were
first auditioned, remembered, and later transcribed by a male scribe, and later
became part of written history. Those familiar with fieldwork data collection

7 For an exhaustive and comprehensive survey, see Saiyid Athar Abbas Rizvi’s A History of
Sufism in India (two volumes-. vol. 1. Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers, 1978 and vol.
2. Lahore Suhail Academy, 2004).
56 Chapter 2

and note-taking research method or of applying storytelling research method,

know that in addition to notetaking, most of the data is first stored in memory
by audition, particularly in the absence of audiotaping. As the spoken word
of the most sanctified individuals who, in public perception, were held as
sacred institutions of society, these discourses were heard to be memorised
and practicalised, and not to be questioned or doubted. As such, these dis-
courses move beyond the textual boundaries and enter everyday life. Ḥasan
Sijzi (652/1254–738/1337), the compiler of the most popular and most widely
read malfūẓ, i.e., the Fawa‌ʾidu’l-fuʾād,8 in his brief foreword refers to the spoken
words of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, describing them in his flowery Persian
as jawāhir-i ghaibī (gems of mystery) and zawāhir-i lāraibī (beautiful flowers
that cannot be distrusted). He also admits that whatever he audited, either the
exact blessed word (ʿain lafz-mubārak) or its meaning, he inscribed according
to his limited understanding (baqadr-i fahm-i mukhtaṣar).9 Ḥasan Sijzi rightly
anticipated that as these discourses of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ would benefit
the hearts of many an afflicted reader (dilhā-yi dard-mandān), and therefore
he gave it the name Fawāʾidu’l-fuʾād (Benefits for the heart).10 The contents of
these discourses, at least in the case of Fawāʾidu’l-fuʾād, we know well, cour-
tesy of Ḥasan Sijzi, covered vast themes of great interest. Thus, for instance, in
Majlis 28 of 708/1309, Sijzi, in a private audience (dar khilwat) with the Shaikh,
categorises these as sermons and homilies (wʿāz-i naṣīḥat), stimulation for sub-
mission [to Allāh] (targhīb dar ṭāʿat), narratives of the Sufi Masters (ḥikāyāt-i
mashāʾikh), and stories about his own life (aḥwāl-i īshāṅ).
The malfūzāt also describe how the audience used to take their seats, after
prostrating before the Shaikh or kissing his hands, with hands folded, heads
bowed down in reverence, listening silently with rapt attention, without inter-
rupting or questioning either the source or the content of the spoken word.
The Shaikh also spoke from his memory. In almost all these sessions, moral
tales, didactic stories, even fables, were narrated by the Shaikh as an effective
method of spiritual instruction. On some occasions, the Sufi master intro-
duced a topic of the session’s (majlis) discussion, while in most other cases,
he spoke in response to a question asked by one of the audiences or disciples.
Rules and etiquettes (ādāb), however, were specified even for such random

8 Fawāʾidu’l- fuʾād is read not only with great devotion by ordinary persons but even the
Sufis continued to have the deepest reverence for it. For instance, Shah Fahkhru’d-Dīn (d.
1784) always kept a copy of Fawāʾidu’l fuʾād close to his body. See Nawwāb Ghāzīu’d-Dīn
Khān ‘Nizām’. 1315/1897. Manāqib-i Fakhariyā. Dilhi: Maṭbaʿ Mujtabāʾī, pp. 16–17.
9 FF, p. 2.
10 Fawāʾidu’l fuʾād is the most popular book in the reading list of those interested in Sufi
literature. Online booksellers deliver it at affordable prices.
The Sufi Texts 57

discussions. For instance, Abū Najīb Suhrāwardī’s (490–563/1096–1168) kitāb

ādābu’l-murīdīn (book on the etiquettes of the disciples), a popular reading
among the Indian Chishtī Sufis, laid out rules for Sufi masters’ discourses. For
example, it says that a Sufi should not speak out and should remain silent until
a question is asked. Whenever he decides to speak, the Sufi should speak with
the intention (niyyat) of guiding his audience to the right path (rāh-i ḥaqq)
to kindle in their hearts quest for the redemption of their soul (ṭalab-i nijāt).11
There were etiquettes for attending the discourse assemblies of the saints as
well. In one of the assemblies of Khwāja Niẓāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, the theme
of which Ḥasan Sijzi describes as sukhun dar ādāb-i majlis wa dar āmdan bā
khidmat-i pīr wa ādāb nishastan wa maqām giriftan (discourse on proper con-
duct in the assemblies and [about] presenting oneself before the saint, and
proper conduct of taking a seat and getting a place to sit), the Khwāja first
narrated a Tradition of the Prophet concerning Gabriel, who conveyed Allāh’s
command about proper conduct for entering and taking a seat at a circle. He
then said that the proper conduct is that whoever enters the assembly should
sit down wherever a place is available; whoever tries to get a seat in the centre
is cursed (malʿūn ast).12
Khwāja Gīsū Darāz, who translated ʿAbu’l-Najīb Suhrawardī’s (d. 563/1168)
kitāb ādābu’l-murīdīn into Persian, while talking about the ways and manners
of Sufi Masters in his discussion Assembly of 7 Shawwāl 802/1400, narrated that
once as he entered the assembly of his spiritual mentor, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn
Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī, one of the Shaikh’s disciples from Khurāsān got up
to welcome him and saluted him. At this, the Shaikh told him that this prac-
tise of rising up to greet a person while present in your Shaikh’s assembly is
not an approved practise. He then cited the example of kingly courts and said
that because of the awe and power of a king, no one would dare to greet and
pay respect to anyone while present in the court. Similarly, anyone who pays
respect to any person other than the pīr is guilty of disrespecting the Shaikh
and commits a serious offence.13 The spiritual sessions, thus, centred around
the Shaikh.

11 Khwāja Bandā Nawāz Chishtī, and Saiyyid ʿAṭā Ḥusain. Tarjumā-yi ādābu᾽l-murīdīn (Per-
sian translation of Suhrawardī’s Arabic work ādābu᾽l-murīdīn) (Hyderabad: Maṭbūʿa-yi
Intiẓāmī,1939), pp. 112–13; also see this works’ Urdu translation, Abdu’l-Qādir ibn
ʿAbdullah Suhrawardī and Muḥammad ʿAbdu’l Bāsiṭ. Ādābu’l-murīdīn- āthwiṅ sadi kā
dastūru’l-ʿamal (Lahore: Tassawuf Foundation, 1998), p. 41.
12 FF, Majlis 32, 11 Zilḥajj, 709.
13 Khwāja Bandā Nawāz Gīsū Darāz (Compiled by Muḥammad Akbar Ḥusainī. Sharaḥ
Jawāmiu’l-kilam (malfūzāt of Sayyid Gīsū Darāz, compiled by Akbar Ḥusainī. Translated
58 Chapter 2

From the perspective of social history, the malfūzāt reflect the trajectory of
their era and, at the same time, become markers and pathsetters for genera-
tions to come. In light of this, the malfūzāt remain a major significant source
showing how the Sufi-Khānqāh discourses generated and shaped social codes
of behaviour or, to use the words of Nizami, helped one to “feel the pulse of
the medieval India.”14 Thus, the basic aim of this section is to convey the mul-
tifaceted aspects and impact of these discourses, in their original form as spo-
ken words, and later, as textual guidebooks for generations that followed. This
investigation, I expect, would create a source material for further investigation
of factors that lead to a cognitive understanding of women’s representation
as unequal to men in their physical, social, economic, political, and religious
standings.
Malfūzāt, thus, are not the creation of one individual; these were produced
by a duo: the scribe and the Master or Shaikh. Precautions were indeed taken
regarding the transference of the spoken to the scribed word. Fawāʾidu’l-fuʾād
illustrates this best in Majlis 28 held on 18 Shawwāl 708/30 March 1309. By
this time, one year had passed since Ḥasan Sijzi had recorded the discourses
of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ on six folios of paper. The Shaikh read all and, in
between his reading of the text, kept appreciating Ḥasan Sijzi’s writing skills by
commenting, “You have written it excellently” (nekū niwishta). He read the text
so carefully that he could notice blank spaces at one or two spots and enquired
of Ḥasan Sijzi, “Why have you left blank spaces in the text” (īṅ bayaẓ chirā
guzashtā)? Ḥasan Sijzi admitted that he had left out those words that he could
not fully remember or understand (nekū mʿalūm na kard būdam). Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ, with kindness, re-explained all the missing words (baqia har kalimāt).
This episode indeed is less about the excellence of Ḥasan Sijzi’s penmanship;
rather, it reflects Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ’s concern for accurate transmission
to the audience. At the same time, being well aware of the power that words
wield, he encouraged Ḥasan Sijzi by telling him, albeit indirectly, that record-
ing discourses of a mystic is not merely a skilled feat of a good scribe; spiritual
charisma (karāmat) becomes part of it. In this connection, he recalled that on
the very first day when he was blessed with the fortune of presenting himself
before Shaikhu’l Islam Farīdu’d-Dīn, he was led by the desire to record every
single blessed word uttered by the Shaikh. The Shaikh also approved of it to
such an extent that whenever he would narrate a story (ḥikāyat) or make a

by Wāhid Bakhsh Siyāl Chishtī Ṣābirī). (Lahore: al-Faisal, 2010), (henceforth, referred to as
haraḥ Jawāmiu’l-kilam), p. 368.
14 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. Some Aspects of Religion and Politics in India During the Thirteenth
Century. (Delhi: Idarah Adabiyat-i Delhi, 1978), p. 374.
The Sufi Texts 59

point (ishārat), to make sure that his scribe, in this case Nizāmu’d-Dīn, was
present, he would say [to Nizāmu’d-Dīn] “Are you there (ḥāẓir hast)?” If he was
not there, the Shaikh would repeat the moral ( fa‌ʾidā) that he had narrated dur-
ing Nizāmu’d-Dīn’s absence (ghībat). This exercise of inscribing his Shaikh’s
discourses resulted in a miracle when a man all of a sudden brought for him
several sheets of white paper, bound together (yakjā jild kardā) to write the
discourses. Nizāmu’d-Dīn accepted these sheets of paper and on the top page,
in thanksgiving, first wrote down Subhān Allāh, alḥamdulillah, and la hawlā
walā quwwatā illā billāhil ʿaliyill ʿazīm, and next his mentor’s discourses. He,
then told Ḥasan Sijzi that the collection of those discourses (majmūʿa) was still
with him.
Similarly, to check the accuracy of what Ḥamīd Qalandar, his malfūz scribe,
wrote, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī, on several occasions asked him to
read out what he had written. At times, he would read the text himself. Thus,
when, after a year of his attendance at the Shaikh’s spiritual assemblies and
compiling his sayings, Ḥamīd Qalandar presented it to him, the Shaikh read it
(muṭālaʿ farmūdand) and greatly appreciated it.15 Thus, we see that the texts of
these first two foundational malfūzāt accurately present the views of the Sufi
Shaikhs and therefore the words carry weight even today.

2.4 The Sufi Ṭabaqāt

The next source for the study of Sufism is the ṭabaqāt literature. Written about
male Sufis and compiled chronologically, the ṭabaqāt, in essence, are much
like biographical collections or compendiums.16 There are several ṭabaqāt
texts about the Sufis who lived outside the geographic landscape of South
Asia, starting from the earliest known work, Ṭabaqāt al-Sufiyya of Abū ʿAbdʾur
Raḥmān as-Sulamī of Nishapur (365/976–412/1021). These writings served as
models for the ṭabaqāt produced in South Asia. I give a list of these without
going into much detail about their contents.

15 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 1959. Khairu’l-majālis: conversations of Shaikh Nasir-u’d-din

Chirāgh of Delhi [ob. 1356] compiled by Hamid Qalandar. Aligarh: Muslim University,
Majlis 1 and Majlis 6. (Henceforth, referred to as KM; also, Shaikh Nasir-u’d-din Chirāgh-i
Dihlī, and Ḥamīd Qalandar. (n. d.). Kitāb-i mustaṭāb-i Sirāju’l majālis, Urdū tarjuma-i
Khairu’l majālis, yaʿnī Malfūẓāt-i Nasīruddīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī. Karachi: Wāhid
Book Depot, 4–5, 23.
16 Among several studies on the ṭabaqāt, The Biographical Tradition in Sufism: The Ṭ̣abaqāt
Genre from al Sulamī to Jāmī of Javid A. Mojaddedi (Surrey: Curzon Press, 2001) gives a
concise perspective.
60 Chapter 2

1. Ṭabaqāt al-Sufiyya of Abū ʿAbdʾur Raḥmān as-Sulamī of Nishapur

(365/976–412/1021).
2. Ḥilyātu’l-awliyāʾ of Abu Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī (d. 430/1038)
3. Ṭabaqāt al-Sufiyya of ʿAbdullāh al-Anṣārī (d. 481/1089)
4. The Ṭabaqāt section of Abu’l Qāsim al-Qushayrī’s Risāla (d. 465/1072)
5. The Ṭabaqāt section of ʿAli Hujwīrī’s Kashfu’l-Maḥjūb (d. 467/1974)
6. ʿAbdu’l Raḥmān Jāmī’s Nafaḥatu’l-uns (d. 898/1492)
One of the early examples of Sufi biographies in South Asia is the work of Amīr
Khwurd or Saiyyid Muḥammad bin Mubārak al-ʿAlawī al-Kirmānī’s Siyaru’l
awliyāʾ dar aḥwāl wa malfūzāt-i mashāʾikh-i Chisht. Based upon the author’s
personal experiences, his eyewitnessed life of the Sufi ways at Ajodhan and
Delhi, the two early centres of South Asian Sufism, Amīr Khwurd’s text moves
the reader back into the time when the book was produced. The Siyaru’l awliyāʾ
is also the most authentic and valuable source about the pious women as some
were personally known to him. Indeed, very little has been added to the lives
of Bībī Qarsum, Bībī Zubaida, and Bībī Rānī except what has been penned by
Amīr Khwurd.
The next work, in chronological sequence, is the Siyaru’l ʿᾹrifīn of Ḥāmid bin
Faẓlu’llah, also known as Darwish Jamālī Kambo, compiled between 937/1530
and 942/1536. The work includes Sufi biographies, in addition to the Chishtīs,
of the Suhrawardīs.

2.5 The Spurious Malfūzāt

In addition to the genuine malfūzāt, several spurious or fabricated malfūzāt

also exist. Fake malfūzāt have a long history. In his discourse session held on
2 Ramaẓān 802/1400, Khwāja Gīsū Darāz narrated how Khwāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn
Chirāgh-i Dihlī destroyed these fake malfūzāt by tearing the pages and throw-
ing them into water. Khwāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn also commented that the malfūzāt
of Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar, attributed to Maulānā Badru’d-Dīn Isḥāq, were
bogus.17 Scholars such as Habib had listed these and rejected them as spurious
writings.18 But because these were ascribed to revered Sufis, these unauthen-
ticated texts not only were carefully preserved as sacred relics (tabarruk kai

17 Sharaḥ Jawāmiu’l-kilam, p. 232.

18 M. Habib.1950. “Chishti mystic records of the Sultanate period.” Medieval Indian Quar-
terly, 1 (2): pp. 1–42, reprinted in K.A. Nizami, (Edited). Politics and Society during the
Early Medieval Period, Collected Works of Mohammad Habib, Vol. I (Delhi, P.P.H., 1974),
pp. 385–433.
The Sufi Texts 61

khayāl sai), but their copies were prepared, and some even printed, which bears
weight because of the religious-cultural psyche of South Asian Muslims.19 Rizvi
comments that these forged discourses were prepared “to cater for the spiri-
tual curiosity of gullible admirers … by anonymous authors who were bereft
of either a feeling for history or a first-hand knowledge of their heroes” and
were written in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries in Persian.20 Siddiqi
argued that one reason for the popularity of a fake collection of malfūzāt was
economic as they fetched a handsome price to booksellers.21 Most scholars
recognise the following seven works as forged and apocryphal malfūzāt :
1. The Anīsu’l arwāḥ: the forged discourses of Shaikh ʿUsmān Hārwanī (d.
1220) said to be authored by Khwajā Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī of Ajmer (d.
1235).22
2. The Dalilu’l-ʿārifīn: the alleged discourses of Khwajā Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī
of Ajmer and said to be authored by his disciple, Khwajā Quṭbu’d-Dīn
Bakhtiyār Kākī (d. 1235).23
3. The Fawāʾīdu’s-sālikīn: the alleged discourses of Khwajā Quṭbu’d-Dīn
Bakhtiyār Kākī, said to be composed by Khwajā Faridu’d-Dīn Ganj-i
Shakkar.24
4. The Asrāru’l awliyā’: the alleged conversations of Khwajā Faridu’d-Dīn
Ganj-i Shakkar (d. 1265), attributed to his disciple and son-in-law,
Maulānā Badru’d-Dīn Isḥāq.25
5. The Rāḥatu’l-qulūb: the alleged discourses of Khwajā Faridu’d-Dīn Ganj-i
Shakkar, said to be authored by Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyā’.26
6. The Afzalu’l-fawa‌ʾid: the alleged discourses of Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ, said to be the work of Amīr Khusraw.27
7. The Miftāḥu’l-ʿāshiqīn: the spurious discourse of Khwāja Nasīru’d-Dīn
Chirāgh-i Dihlī, said to be authored by Muḥibu’llah.28

19 Muhammad Ḥabīb. 1972. Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ-Ḥayāt wa tʿālīmāt. Delhi: Delhi

University, p. 2.
20 Saiyid Athar Abbas. Rizvi. 1978. A History of Sufism in India. Vol.1. Delhi: Munshiram
Manoharlal Publishers, p. 4.
21 Siddiqi, Iqtidar Husain. 2010. Indo-Persian Historiography up to the Thirteenth Century.
Delhi: Primus Books, p. 59.
22 Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī. Anīsu’l arwāḥ. Lucknow: Maṭbāʿ Ḥusainī, 1872.
23 Khwāja Quṭbu’d-Dīn Bakhtiyār Kākī. Dalilu’l-ʿārifīn. Kanpur: Nawal Kishore, 1889.
24 Khwāja Faridu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar. 1311/1893. Fawāʾīdu’s-sālikīn. Dilhi: Maṭbāʿ Mujtabāʾī.
25 Badru’d-Dīn Isḥāq. Asrāru’l awliyā’. Kanpur: Nawal Kishore, 1890.
26 Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyā’. Rāḥatu’l-qulūb. Delhi: Maṭbāʿ Mujtabāʾī, 1309/1891.
27 Amīr Khusraw. 1305/1887. Afzalu’l-fawāʾid (part 1 & 2) Delhi: Maṭbāʿ Rizwi.
28 Muḥibu’llah. 1309/1891. Miftāḥu’l-ʿāshiqīn. Delhi: Maṭbāʿ Mujtabāʾī.
62 Chapter 2

Surprisingly, the first recognition of some of the above listed “fake” trea-
tises comes from an undisputed scholar, Ruknu’d-Dīn Dabīr Imād Kāshānī
(d. after 1337), a disciple of Shaikh Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb (d. 738/1337), who
was a Khalifa of Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ. Ruknu’d-Dīn showed the first
few pages of Shamāʾilu’l atqiyāʾ (Virtues of the devout) to his Shaikh for his
approval. Ruknu’d-Dīn was a careful scholar and spent much time collect-
ing his sources and establishing their authenticity. Acknowledging his hard
research methodology, he tells his readers that after devoting a considerably
long time (muddat-i madīd) to studying the books and treatises, he made his
selections from the trustworthy (muʿtabar) and the authentic (muʿtamad)
works.29 Thus, in Shamāʾilu’l atqiyā, repeated references from Fawāʾīdu’s-sālikīn,
Rāḥatu’l-qulūb, and Rāḥatu’l muḥibbīn are included, thereby discrediting that
these were spurious texts.
Interestingly, ʿAbdu’l Ḥaqq Muḥaddis (d. 1025/1643), a meticulous scholar,30
in Akhbāru’l Akhyār, one of the most authentic compendiums on the lives of
the Sufis, draws upon several of the above-listed sources.31 More significant
than the spurious nature of the above-mentioned and several other similar Sufi
sources are critical questions, such as those raised by Muzaffar Alam, about
the nature, purpose, and readership of these works.32 It is significant to note
that none of the great Chishtī Sufis authored any Sufi treatise or text. Khwāja
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ strongly refuted that the Chishtī Shaikhs ever wrote
any book. In response to a person saying that a man in Awadh showed him a
book that was written by the Khwāja, the Shaikh at once said, “He spoke a lie
(tafāwut gufta). No, I have not written any book (man hech kitāb na niwishta).”33

2.6 Writing Biographies of Sufi Women

In this section, my purpose is to identify and review sources of information

for learning about the lives of Sufi women. Since hardly any work has come to

29 Ruknu᾽d-Dīn Imād Kāshānī. 1347/1929. Shamāʾil u’l atqiyāʾ [The virtues of the devout], ed.
by Saiyyid ῾Aṭā᾽ Ḥusain. Hyderababd: Ashraf Press, p. 3, 4.
30 For his life and writings, see Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 1964. Ḥayāt Shaikh ʿAbdul Ḥaqq
Muḥaddis Dihlawi. Dehli: Nadwatu’l Muṣannifīn.
31 ʿAbdu’l-Ḥaqq ibn Saifu’d-Dīn Muḥaddis Dihlawī. 1280/1864. Akhbāru’l-akhyār fī
asrāru’l-abrār. Dihlī: Maṭbaʿ Hāshimī: Maktabā Mujtabāʾī. The book was probably com-
piled between 993–999. Over the centuries several Persian editions and Urdu translations
have appeared.
32 Muzaffar Alam. 2003. ‘The culture and politics of Persian in precolonial Hindustan.’ In
Literary Cultures in History. Reconstructions from South Asia. Edited by Sheldon I. Pollock.
Berkeley: University of California Press, pp. 131–19.
33 FF, Majlis 5th, 15 Muḥarram, 710/1310.
The Sufi Texts 63

light that deals exclusively with Sufi women of the region of South Asia, I was
left with no other option than to sift through the pages of the existing works.
However, regardless of the fact that medieval hagiographical texts and tazkirās
do not specifically present the lives of women awliyāʾ and rarely include a sep-
arate account of their lives, these works nonetheless reflect attitudes and views
of male mystics and their disciples about women. Reading between the lines
of these texts, much which at first looks hidden and omitted gradually unveils
itself. Similar to putting a jigsaw puzzle together, this exercise is not without
success because gradually the whole picture begins to emerge.
The sources that I explore include texts, both manuscripts and printed
works, inscriptions on archaeological finds, existing shrines, and nonwrit-
ten sources, such as oral traditions. There are at least two critical things that
one should note before proceeding further. First, written Sufi texts, particu-
larly of the genre of malfūz of any woman Sufi, not only from South Asia but
also from other Muslim lands, are not known to exist. Second, women authors
of malfūzāt, tazkirāt, and ṭabaqāt also are not yet discovered and identified.
The only exception is Mūnisu’l-arwāḥ (Companion of the souls), completed
in 1049/1639, a biographical compendium of Chishtī saints of India, by Jahān
Ārāʾ Begum (1614–1681), the eldest child of the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan
(r. 1628–1658) and Mumtāz Mahal (d. 1040/1631).34 Her other work, a Sufi treatise
titled Risāla-yi ṣāḥibiyya, which she completed in 1641, is an autobiographical
account of her worldly sojourns in search of the Divine.35 In another category
of Sufi texts, which consists of advice and guidance for Sufi novices, another
Sufi woman surpassed even men. Bebe Nekbakhta of the Mumuza‌ʾī tribe of the
Pashtūns in 1562 wrote Irshādu’l Fuqarāʾ (directions for the right way for the
ascetics), mainly addressing male Sufis. Almost all the other existing Sufi texts
are distinctly written and produced by men for only a male audience.36
The following paragraphs present a brief appraisal of texts that are relevant
to our theme of pious women’s life stories. Biographies of women are rare;
autobiographies by women are rarer still. Together this absence creates a void
in our understanding of women’s lives and poses a challenge in compiling and
writing women’s history. The challenge gets enormous when other historical
texts avoid, omit, or suppress any acknowledgement of women’s presence and
relegate them to an addendum. More complex difficulties arise when brief

34 Jahān Ārāʾ Begum, Mūnisu’l-arwāḥ. 1638. Translated in Urdu as Muʿīnu’l- arwāḥ by Maulawī
Muḥammad ʿAbduṣ-Ṣamad Kalīm Qādirī. Dihlī: Matbāʿ Rizwi, (1891).
35 Jahān Ārāʾ Begam Risāla-yi ṣāḥibiyya with Persian text and Urdu and English translation
by Muhammad Aslam and Sardar Ali Ahmad Khan. Lahore: Ashraf Printing Press, 1993.
36 Muḥammad Hotak, ʿAbd al-Ḥayy Ḥabībī, and Khushal Ḥabībī. 1997. The Hidden treasure:
a biography of Pas̲htoon poets = Pat̲a k̲h̲azana. Lanham: University Press of America,
pp. 138–39.
64 Chapter 2

or sparse references are made about women, keeping them anonymous, as

these sparse accounts could be erroneously interpreted as the real picture of
women, playing a minimal role only. In the second half of the last century,
some commendable efforts were made to recover the lost lives of women
through academic research and sociopolitical activism. Such efforts did not
meet with high success but did lead to newer searches into areas that still are
male-hegemonized zones of knowledge and action. Among such areas are the
stories of Sufi women of South Asia.
Primary sources examined to construct women’s biographical notices in
this work are written mostly in Persian, barring a few in Arabic. All these works
are penned by male authors within the cultural landscape of Hindustan. Thus,
these texts reflect the predominant local colour of male supremacy. A deeper
analytical study of these texts reveals that the authors envisioned a male read-
ership for their writings. References to women in these texts are sparse, mostly
incidental and anecdotal, and are used either to eulogise men who success-
fully shielded themselves from the so-called maximised and amplified fitna of
women or succumbed to their assumed and alleged base influence. These nar-
ratives, in most instances, are hagiographical in nature and are readapted by
those texts that were composed later. The vocabulary used, both in the original
Persian texts and in their Urdu translations, is often derogatory. Indeed, the
language of these texts reflects the historic “lived” reality of dehumanisation
of women in South Asia. Thus, by the mechanism of repetition, falsified and
erroneous views get established as verified and authentic documents of infor-
mation. This mutates history and historical writings and transforms them into
patriarchal manifestos.
Further, and more importantly, biographical notices of women are added,
if at all, either in the form of an appendix at the end of the work or a separate
section provided for women at the end of the text. Probably this was done in
compliance with the tradition that women must remain physically separated
from unrelated (nā-maḥram) men. Sufi women, thus, are not the central sub-
ject of these works. Within the category of pious women (ṣāliḥāt wā ʿābidāt)
referred to in the primary sources, the most oft-mentioned ones are moth-
ers, daughters, sisters, and, to a lesser extent, wives of the celebrated Shaikhs.
These women are eulogised as models of chastity (‘iffat), obedience (ṭāʿat), and
patience (ṣabr). Unrelated women are a rarity. The present study examines Sufi
women as individuals and not as appendages of their males. This, however,
does not mean negation or rejection of their family ties.
Another methodological challenge arises from the fragmentary and scat-
tered references about women under the honorific title of ʿaurat ṣāliḥāt
(pious women) in Sufi texts. Only a close reading of the texts, comparing one
The Sufi Texts 65

reference with another, and then checking it with the period in which the text
was inscribed, yields some results. Some later historians, writing the history of
Sufism in South Asia, tend to gloss over such scattered references and hence
even these find no place in secondary sources. The misogynistic historiography
and hagiography are understandable, as some of the best known early Muslim
thinkers, chroniclers, and scribes, steeped in their social conventions and reli-
gious dogmatism, could not rise to comprehend and appreciate the egalitar-
ian guidelines of the Qurʾan, which resulted in restricting women’s agency
with such malevolent force that is very difficult to erase. What perplexes a
researcher and confuses an inquisitive reader of such texts is the contradictory
nature of some of the narratives ascribed to Sufi Masters. Nonetheless, these
fragmentary references, biased in their intent and misleading in their diction,
allow us to practice a jigsaw type of exercise and elevate women to their proper
place in the historical context.

2.7 Women in the Biographical Compendiums Written outside

South Asia

Contrary to such general neglect and omission, Abu Nuʿaym Aḥmad ibn
ʿAbdu’llah al-Iṣfahānī’s (d. 430/1038) monumental work, Ḥilyātu’l awliyāʾ wa
ṭabaqātu’l aṣfiyāʾ (completed in the 5th H/11th CE), made a significant con-
tribution in recording women’s biographies. This huge collection consisting
of 649 biographies, contains 28 biographies of women, all belonging to the
days of the Prophet.37 Abu’l Qāsim al-Qushayrī (d. 465/1072), while he did
not include women among the biographical notices of 83 men, had several
negative references to women in his widely read treatise on Sufism, the Risāla,
written in 1064.38 Thus, for instance, Qushayrī quotes Abū Yazīd b. Ṭayfūr b.
ʿIsā al-Basṭāmī (d. 848 or 875), saying that “Once I intended to ask God to save
me the trouble of caring about food and women. Then I said [to myself] how

37 Abū Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī, Aḥmad ibn ʿAbd Allāh, and Muhammad M. Al-Akili. 1995. The
beauty of the righteous & ranks of the elite: a collection of 1000 rare accounts of the blessed
companions of God’s messenger Muhammad based on the classic 10th century work of
Imam al-Hafiz Abu Naʿim al-Asfahāni (948–1038 CE) Hilyat-ul Awliya wa Tabaqãt al-Asfiya.
Philadelphia, PA: Pearl Pub. House; for Urdu translation, see Abū Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī,
Aḥmad ibn ʿAbd Allāh, and Muḥammad Aṣghar Mughal. 2006. Ḥilyātu’l awliyāʾ wa
tabaqātu’l aṣfiyāʾ. Karachi: Dāru’l Ishāʿat.
38 The Risāla remains a popular reading in contemporary Pakistan as several Urdu transla-
tions are easily available at a moderate price, in addition to online downloadable versions
of the text.
66 Chapter 2

can I ask God what the Messenger of God—May God bless and greet him—
never [dared] to ask? So, I did not ask God [for that]. Then God—May He be
blessed and exalted—protected me from the desire of women in such way
that I no longer cared whether there was before me a woman or a wall.”39 al-
Qirmisini Muzaffar, a Sufi from Damascus or Azerbaijan, is reported to have
said: “The worst kind of attachment is attachment to women in whatever
form!”40 In his advice to the Sufi aspirants, al-Qushayrī said, “It is the aspi-
rant’s duty—which applies to all those who travel along this [Sufi] path—not
to accept any favors from women, not to mention actively seeking them. This
is the way of the masters of the Sufi community and what they have advised
others to do.”41 Contrary to Qushayrī’s texts, ʿAlī ibn al-Jawzī (d. 597/1200) in
his Ṣifāt al Ṣifwā (Characteristics of a sincere friend)42 included narratives of
about 240 women.43 It is interesting to note that even al-Jawzī does not recog-
nise all women by their names and simply describes them as “devout women.”
Faridu’d-Dīn ʿAṭṭār of Nishapur (d. 617/1220), the Sufi poet and a prolific writer,
in his Tazkiratu’l awliyāʾ (Memorial of God’s friends), composed in the early
thirteenth century, included only one pious woman in his account of more
than seventy male Sufis. As he thought that people might question him regard-
ing the inclusion of a woman in the midst of male Sufis, he began Rābiʿa
al-ʿAdawiyya’s account by a supposition that if anyone questions him, say-
ing, “why have you included her in the rank of men (dar ṣaf-i rijāl),” he would
answer it by offering three reasons. First, because of a Tradition of the Prophet
that two-thirds of the faith is narrated by ʿᾹiʾshā Ṣiddīqa; secondly, it is said by
ʿAbbās Ṭūsī that on the day of Resurrection when men would be called, among
men (rijāl) Maryam [Mary] would step forward first; and thirdly, if Rābiʿa had
not attended the assemblies of Ḥasan Baṣari, he would not have included her.
In conclusion, ʿAṭṭār observed that it is of no use to distinguish between male
and female when one talks about God.44 Surprisingly, during my shrine visits,
one in Karachi and the other in Lahore, I heard this gendered comment of

39 ʿAbd al-Karīm ibn Hawāzin al-Qushayrī, Alexander D. Knysh, and Muhammad S Eissa.
2007. Al-Qushayri’s Epistle on Sufism: Al-Risala al-qushayriyya fi ʿilm al-taṣawwuf. Lebanon:
Garnet Publishing, p. 32.
40 Ibid, pp. 65–66.
41 Ibid, p. 415.
42 Saeko Yazaki. 2013. Islamic Mysticism and Abū Ṭālib al-Makkī: The Role of the Heart.
Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge.
43 Ruth Roded. 1994. Women in Islamic Biographical Collections: From Ibn Sa‘d to Who’s Who.
Boulder: L. Rienner Publishers, pp. 92–93.
44 Farīd al-Dīn Aṭṭār (Edited by Reynold Alleyne Nicholson, and Muḥammad Qazvīnī). 1903.
Tadhkirat al-awliyāʾ. Leiden: Brill, pp. 59–60; Faridu’d-Dīn ʿAṭṭār. 1997. Tazkiratu’l-awliyāʾ
(Urdu translation). Lahore: al-Farūq Book Foundation, p. 41; ‘Aṭṭār, Farīd al-Dīn, and
The Sufi Texts 67

ʿAṭṭār. At both of these places, the male attendants at the shrines had copies
of the Urdu translation of Tazkiratu’l-awliyāʾ; one even opened the particular
page and read this out to me. His argument was that even women of the stature
of Bībī Rābiʿa could attain their status only because of the male Sufis. This calls
to mind Valerie Hoffman-Ladd’s comment on ʿAṭṭār that, “although this ‘com-
pliment’ paid to Rābi’a implies the degradation of the female sex as a whole
and suggests that true spirituality is normally found only among men, it also
indicates that the sex of the body is not a barrier to the inspiration and grace
of God.”45
Nūru’d-Dīn ʿAbdʾur Raḥmān Jāmī of Herat (d. 898/1492), a Naqshbandī Sufi,
in his Nafaḥātu’l-uns min ḥaẓarātu’l-quds, which is a compendium of Sufi
biographies completed in 883/1478, in a long list of 587 male Sufis, included
34 Sufi women of which 8 are anonymous.46 At the end of his copious work,
Jāmī added a section of briefly written notices on Sufi women under the head-
ing fi zikruʾnisāʾ al-ʿārifāt al-wāṣilāt ilā marātib al-rijāl (An account of those
pious women who rose to the status of men).47 The linguistic composition and
the setting of this heading not only “demarcated [this section] from the main
sequence,” as Mojaddedi comments,48 but it also served as a prologue to his
crisp comments about women’s saintly merits that follow as an introduction
to this section. He prefaced his short narrative of Sufi women by referring to
an apologia to chapter 73 of Fatūḥāt al-makkiyyā of Ibn al-ʿArabi in which he
says that there are more men than women when one writes about the Sufis.
Jāmī’s dislike for women in general is well reflected in his other works. For
instance, in Salāmān wa Absāl he describes them as devoid of intelligence and
lacking in faith, and accuses them as being dishonest, unfaithful, cunning, and
distrustful.49 Although these 34 women are not of South Asian background,
I have included Jāmī’s work here because of its reception at the popular level.

A.J. Arberry. 1966. Muslim Saints and Mystics: Episodes from the Tadhkirat al-Auliya.
[Chicago]: University of Chicago Press, p. 40.
45 Valerie J. Hoffman-Ladd. 1992. “Mysticism and Sexuality in Sufi Thought and Life,” Mystics
Quarterly 18 (3): 83–93.
46 ʿAbdur Raḥmān Jāmī (Edited and translated by W. Nassau Lees). 1858. Nafaḥāt al-uns.
Calcutta: Maṭbʿa Līssī.; also, its Urdu translation, Jāmī, ʿAbdur Raḥman. 2002. Nafaḥāt al-
uns (Urdu translation by Aḥmad ʿAlī Shāh Chishtī Nizāmi, Lahore: Shabbir Brothers).
47 ʿAbdur Raḥmān Jāmī. 1858, Ibid. pp. 718–39.
48 Javid A. Mojaddedi. 2001. The Biographical Tradition in Sufism, p. 152.
49 Farah Fatima Golparvaran Shadchehr. 2008. ʿAbd al-Rahman Jami: Naqshbandi Sufi,
Persian poet. Columbus, Ohio: Ohio State University. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view
?acc_num=osu1217869380, particularly pages 66–68 and 141; Chad G. Lingwood. 2014.
Politics, Poetry, and Sufism in Medieval Iran: New Perspectives on Jāmī’s Salāmān va Absāl.
Leiden: Brill.
68 Chapter 2

Thus, his views and the subtlety of his expressions are part of the classroom
teachings of his works; there has been prolific production of translations of
his books into various South Asian languages, in addition to other languages of
the world, and these are referenced as primary sources in academic writings.
Nafaḥātu’l-uns, despite the above-mentioned limitations of its author, remains
a model tazkira and its author one of the most respected and loved ones since
the days of Babur, the sixteenth-century founder of Mughal empire in India.
A great forward step in presenting Sufi women’s biographies has been
taken by Rkia Elaroui Cornell by translating from the Arabic into English
AbūʿAbdar-Raḥmān as-Sulamī’s (d. 412/1021) Dhikr an-Niswa al-Mutaʿabidāt
as-Ṣūfiyyāt, which is an independent compendium of Sufi women. The text
gives biographical notices of eighty Sufi women, from the eighth and eleventh
centuries, selected from the region outside South Asia and mainly from what
is known as the central Islamic lands.50 The second work is Women in Islamic
Biographical Collections: From Ibn Saʿd to Who’s Who by Ruth Roded.51 In this
work, covering a period from the early ninth century to the end of the last
century, mystic women form only a part of the text; the others included are
learned and powerful women.
It comes as a pleasant surprise that Saiyyid Muḥammad Ashraf Jahāngīr
Simnānī (d. 1437), a Chishtī Sufi immigrant from the Central Asian princely
state of Simnān (Khurāsān) to Padua, Bengal, who later settled in Kachawcha
in Eastern UP India, is the only one from among the Sufis who refers to
as-Sulamī’s Dhikr an-Niswa al-Mutaʿabidāt as-Ṣūfiyyā as a separate and well-
written book with great details about Sufi women (ʿalāḥida kitāb jamʿ karda ast
wa sharḥ bisyār az o īshāṅ dar bayān āward).52 He must have read and probably
had his own copy of the book which later became lost to scholars and readers.
It seems that the contents of the book did not cause much change in Simnānī’s
perception of women and their status as spiritual persons.

2.8 Women in the Sufi Sources and Biographical Compendiums of

South Asia

2.8.1 Kashfu’l Mahjūb and the Portrayal of Women

Abu’l Ḥasan ʿAlī Ibn ʿUsmān al-Jullābi al-Hujwīrī al-Ghaznawi, popularly
known as Dāta Ganj Bakhsh, died at Lahore in 1071. It was there that he wrote

50 Rkia Elaroui Cornell. 2005. Early Sufi Women: Dhikr an-Niswa al-Muta ʿabbidāt aṣ-Ṣūfiyyāt.
Lahore: Suhail Academy.
51 Ruth Roded. 1994. Women in Islamic Biographical Collections. Boulder: L. Rienner Publishers.
52 Ibid, p. 330.
The Sufi Texts 69

the first known treatise on Sufism in Persian, the Kashfu’l Mahjūb. He had met
al-Qushayri and had attended his assemblies, but he failed to include women,
except Rābiʿa, in his more than one hundred biographical accounts of male
Sufis.53 The Kashfu’l Mahjūb of ʿAlī-Hujwīrī, the first Sufi text written on the
soil of Hindustan, is both a manual on the Sufi way of life and a compendium
of short biographical notices of male Sufis.
The absence of any accounts of female Sufis, except a separate one of Rābiʿa
of Basra, makes this text incomplete in its contents, despite its author’s claim to
provide sound information on Sufis and Sufism. This omission is alarming for
two main reasons: first, Hujwīrī was well aware of the fact that gnosis (maʿrifa)
has no gender, as gnosis in its essence comes from the Divine; and second, this
treatise, being the first Sufi text written in India, continues to be considered a
foundational thesis of Sufism. Indeed, off-guard phrases in Hujwīrī’s text reflect
that even a person of his stature had deeply buried biases against women. For
example, in his narrative of Abu’l Ḥasan Samnūn b. ʿAbdullah al-Khawwās (d.
289/910), while relating the incident of a woman who desired to marry Abu’l
Ḥasan Samnūn but was rejected and rebuffed by him, falsely accused (tuhmat)
him of “having attempted her virtue.” Hujwīrī in between his narration adds
that she did this as women mostly do accuse [men].54
In another episode, the story of Abu’l Faiẓ Zu’l-nūn b. Ibraḥīm al-Miṣrī
(d. 245/860–861), he describes how Zu’l-nūn al-Miṣrī mistook an unnamed old
woman wearing a coarse woollen cloak ( jubbā-yi pishmīn) with a staff holding
a water carrier (ukkāza) in her hand on the coast of Syria. When asked where
she was coming from, she said, “From God” (az nazd-i khudā), and when asked
where she was going to, she answered, “To God” (ba-sau-yi khuda). Despite
these obvious signs of Sufis travelling from God to God, Zu’l-nūn al-Miṣrī, mis-
took her to be a poor destitute woman in need of help and offered her a piece
of gold (dīnār) in alms. Perhaps to Zu’l-nūn, a woman Sufi was not an expected
sight. More revealing is the response of this unnamed old woman who appears
in Zu’l-nūn’s story as a subtheme, a prop, and not as the main story. The
woman, however, instead of describing Zu’l-nūn as safinā-yi taḥqīq wa karāmāt
(a ship of truth and charisma) as does Hujwīrī, tells him that he was offer-
ing her money because of his rakīkʿaql (shallow intellect) while she accepts
nothing from anyone but only from Him.55 Hujwīrī, however, concludes that
this woman’s conversation was a proof of her sincere love for God (dalīl ṣidq-i
muḥabbat). This same story was earlier narrated by Abū Bakr al-Kalābādhi

53 Kashfu’l Mahjūb (nuskhā Samarqand). Lahore: Sang-e-Meel Publications. (Henceforth,

referred to as Hujwīrī).
54 Hujwīrī, p. 175.
55 Ibid, pp. 131–132.
70 Chapter 2

of Bukhara (d. 380/990).56 In both narratives, by Kalābādhi and Hujwīrī, the

common thread is their attitude towards women. “In citing only Zūn an-Nūn
al-Miṣrī by name, al-Kalābādhi causes the Egyptian master to appropriate
the Sufi woman’s wisdom as his own,”57 remarks Cornell about Kalābādhi. The
same is equally applicable to Hujwīrī.
Similarly, Hujwīrī, by submerging the story of Faṭima, the daughter of
the ruler of Balkh and wife of Ahmad b. Khiẓrūya al-Balkhi (d. 240/ 854), in the
narrative of her husband, displays a biased projection of Sufi women in their
social roles, in this case, as a wife. Thus, Hujwīrī, diametrically in opposition to
the title of his treatise Kashfu’l Mahjūb, hides the story of Faṭima by not plac-
ing her separately. This comes as a surprise because Hujwīrī quotes a saying of
Abū Yazīd Basṭāmī (d. 261/874)58 that “whoever wishes to see a man disguised
in women’s clothes, let him look at Fāṭima!”59 Despite his obvious aversion to
include Sufi women in their individual capacity in his work, Hujwīrī found
himself compelled to note the high and dignified spiritual merits of Faṭima
(andar ṭarīqat sha‌ʾn-i ʿaẓīm dāsht) who, like a true Sufi, had the courage to rep-
rimand Ahmad b. Khiẓrūya by telling him to be a guide (rāhbar) and not a
brigand (rāh-bur) for those who walk on the Righteous Path (rāh-i ḥaqq).60

2.8.2 South Asian Malfūzāt and Tazkirāt and Sufi Women

As individual male Sufis grew in stature, the focal point of writing Sufi nar-
ratives increasingly became more deferential, often flattering towards these
figures. Along with these accounts of the individual Sufis, detailed accounts of
the male members of the Sufi sisilas that emerged commemorating the names
of the Sufis also gained popularity. Both these writing trends had hardly any
space to fit pious women into these narratives.
Malfūz, or the inscribed discourses of an individual, in this case of a Sufi,
has a unique place in the history of the development of Sufism in South Asia.
Devotion and respect in handling these texts is incredible.61 The first authen-
tic and reliable malfūz, the Fawāʾidu’l-fuʾād, reported the daily discourses of

56 Muḥammad ibn Ibrāhīm Kalābādhī (Edited and translated by A.J. Arberry). The Doctrine
of the Sufis (Kitab al-taʿarruf li-madhhab-ahl al-taṣawwuf). Lahore: Suhail Academy
(2001), p. 11. The only difference in the two narratives, i.e. of Hujwīrī and Kalābādhī, is
that Kalābādhī also says that the woman ended up reciting Surah xxiv: 37 [sura Nūr].
57 Rkia Elaroui Cornell. 2005. Early Sufi women, p. 17.
58 Hellmut Ritter. “Abu Yazid (Bāyazd) Ṭayfūr b. ʿĪsā b. Surūshān al-Biṣṭāmī” EI 2, pp. 162–3.
59 Ibid, p. 155; the quote is from Nicholson, p. 120; for a biographical notice on Fāṭima, see
Cornell. 2005. Early Sufi women, p. 142.
60 Hujwīrī, p. 154.
61 I have seen people who, out of reverence, would not touch Fawa‌ʾid al-fu’ād without per-
forming ablution.
The Sufi Texts 71

Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ starting early in 707/1308 in the city of Delhi.62

The writing came to an end after fifteen years in 722/1322–1323. Amīr Ḥasan
Sijzi, the scribe, combined his devotion and piety as a disciple of Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ with his refined scholarship and polished writing skills and poetical
sensibilities, offering a storehouse of information about the growth and devel-
opment of Sufis and Sufism which grew under the patronage and blessings of
one single person, Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ. Fawāʾidu’l-fuʾād, being a daily diary
of the spiritual sessions of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, is not a record of preset
thematic discussions. Consisting of lessons and counsels for the moral and
spiritual benefits of those who assembled in his gatherings, this malfūz is the
best example of applying the storytelling method adopted by Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ. Although women were not consciously selected or omitted by design
in the discourses, Fawāʾidu’l-fuʾād remains the first Sufi text directly conveying
significant information about them which helps in reconstructing early Sufi
women’s stories.
Ḥāmid Qalandar’s Khairu’l-majālis, which is a compilation of the conver-
sations of Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī (d. 1356), is another reliable
source of the history of the Chishtī Sufis. As compared to other contemporary
sources, Khairu’l-majālis offers more detailed information about Sufi percep-
tion of women, women’s enrollment in the Sufi silsilas, and a general overview
of women’s status as viewed by men in power.63
Contemporary to Fawa‌ʾid al-fuʾād is Siyaru’l Awliyāʾ fi muḥabbatu’l Ḥaqq
jalla waʿalaʿ, known by its shorter title as Siyaru’l Awliyāʾ. Authored by Saiyyid
Muḥammad bin Mubarak ʿAlawī Kirmānī, who had close devotional ties with
Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, Siyaru’l Awliyāʾ is the first classic and authen-
tic example of a biographical dictionary. The author, known as Amir or Mir
Khwurd, reports the firsthand information about pious women related to the
most venerated early Chishtī masters. Similar to most medieval scribes, Mir
Khwurd’s neglect of chronology and inclusion of hagiographical tales often
emerge as a challenge in sifting facts from myths.64
Among all these categories of Sufi literature, the Sufi tazkirāt, in their con-
tents, themes, and selection of personalities discussed, cover a huge panorama,
from the profane to the sacred. In addition to the study of a particular Sufi

62 FF.
63 Ḥāmid Qalandar and Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 1959. Khairu’l-majālis: Conversations of
Shaikh Nasir-u’d-din Chirāgh of Dihli compiled by Hamid Qalandar. Aligarh: Muslim
University. (Henceforth, referred to as KM).
64 Amīr Khwurd, Sayyid Muḥammad bin Mubārak al-Alawi al-Kirmānī. 1302/1885.
Siyaru’l-awliyāʾ dar aḥwāl wa malfūzāt-i mashā᾽īkh-i Chisht. Dihlī: Maṭbaʿ Muḥibb-i-Hind.
(Henceforth, referred to as SA).
72 Chapter 2

Shaikh or of his silsila (Sufi order), some such compendiums present a survey
of almost all the silsilas and their subbranches, thus covering a vast variety of
themes. In addition to the rules of the Sufi path (ṭarīqa), these texts provide
ample information about issues such as marriage, family relations, children,
and vocations. One major challenge or obstacle in reading some of these texts
is the comprehension of the complexity of the language of the “primary” texts,
i.e., the usage of Sufi metaphors and idioms in the medieval Persian texts,
transporting a person through a mundane experience to an esoteric experi-
ence by visualising bride-bridegroom relations in esoteric ways on one hand,
and on the other condemning bride-bridegroom relations in this world as a
Satanic trap.
Among the Sufi biographical accounts, Siyaru’l ʿᾹrifīn (Biographies of the
gnostic), by Ḥāmid bin Faẓlu’llah, also known as Darwish Jamālī Kambo Dihlawī
(d. 942/1536), is an important tazkira of thirteen male Sufis.65 Composed
between 937/1530 and 942/1536, Siyaru’l ʿᾹrifīn is the first work which, along
with the Chishtī Sufis, also includes accounts of the Suhrawardīs. Jamālī
Kambo dedicated his work to his royal patron, Emperor Humāyūn (d. 1556).66
The Age of Akbar, which in terms of thoughts and movements includes the
periods of Akbar and Jahangir, was an era of intense religious and social activ-
ity. Two major prolific writers, both recognized for their Sufi affiliations and
acclaimed for their impact that continues to grow even today, were Shaikh
ʿAbdu’l Ḥaqq Muḥaddis Dihlawī (958/1551–1052/1642–1643),67 a traditional-
ist of the Qadiriyyā Sufi silsila, and Muḥammad Ghausī bin Ḥasan bin Mūsā
Shattāri Māndawī (b. 962/1554–1555). Muḥaddis Dihlawī’s copious compen-
dium, Akhbāru’l-Akhyār fī Asrāru’l-Abrār (Narratives about the chosen ones),
consists of biographical sketches of 225 South Asian Sufis. Written before
996/1588 and later revised in 999/1590–1591, it is considered one of the best
ṭabaqāt produced in India.68 An appendix at the end of the book, under a

65 Ḥāmid bin Faẓlu’llah Jamālī Kambo. 1310/1892. Siyaru’l ʿᾹrifīn. Dihlī: Maṭbaʿ-yi Rizvi.
(Henceforth referred to as Jamālī).
66 For a comprehensive biographical notice on Jamālī Kambo, see Husamuddīn Rashdi’s
introduction (pp. 25–138) in Ayyūb Qadiri’s Urdu translation of Siyaru’l ʿᾹrifīn. See Ḥāmid
bin Faẓlu’llah Jamālī Kamboh.1310/1892. Siyaru’l ʿArifīn (Translated by Muḥammad Ayyūb
Qadiri). Lahore: Markazī Urdu Board (1976).
67 For his life account, see Badāʾūnī, ʿAbdul Qādir bin Mulūk Shāh, (translated by Wolseley
Haig). 1976. Muntakhab ut-tawārīkh, Vol. III. Karachi: Karimsons, pp. 167–72; Khaliq Ahmad
Nizami. 1964. Ḥayāt Shaikh ʿAbd-al-Ḥaqq Muḥaddis Dihlawī. Dehlī: Nadwatu’l-Muṣannifīn.
Nizami gives a list of sixty books authored by Muḥaddis Dihlawī, see pp. 211–14.
68 ʿAbdu’l-Ḥaqq ibn Saifu’d-Dīn Dihlawī. 1280/1863. Akhbāru’l-akhyār fī asrāru’l-abrār. Dehlī:
Maṭbaʿ-yi Hāshimī (several editions of the work in Farsi are available, paginations differ in
all). References in this text are translations from this text. (Henceforth, referred to as AA).
The Sufi Texts 73

separate section consisting of four pages under the heading zikr bāʿz nisā-yi
ṣāliḥāt (An account of few righteous women), gives short biographical notices
of five women: Bībī Sāra (d. 638/1240), Bībī Fāṭima (d. 643/1245), Bībī Qarsum
Khātūn, Bībī Zulaikha (d. 648/1250) and Bībī Awliyā’ (d. 655/1257).69 Muḥaddis
Dihlawī uses superlative terms in glorifying the attributes of these five women,
such as a highly revered (bisyār buzurg) person, from among the righteous,
devout, and godly of the age (az ṣāliḥāt, qānītāt wa ʿabidāt zamāna), and as one
whose prayers are answered (mustajāb-ud daʿwat). As all five pious women in
Muḥaddis Dihlawī’s work belong to the thirteenth century, a legitimate query
here seems justified. Were there no pious and virtuous women in the long span
of four hundred years, the time between the thirteenth century and the period
of the composition of Akhbāru’l-Akhyār? Was the author, despite his research
orientation and depth of knowledge, writing in a sort of social vacuum and
remaining capsuled in a single time frame when writing about virtuous and
God-fearing women? Did he refrain from fresh investigation similar to most
second-rate scholars who are best at only replicating what is known already?
Was the purpose of compiling this text only to seek royal recognition and gifts?
By omitting narratives of pious women other than the selected five, Muḥaddis
Dihlawī negates his self-claimed purpose explained in the introduction (muqa-
ddima) of Akhbāru’l-Akhyār. He says that he attempts to present the narratives
of the pious persons of Hindustan as this country is a special place of the trav-
ellers, devotees, and friends [of God] (maqām-i khāṣṣ ghurabāʾ wa muḥibbān
wa dostān). To do this, Muḥaddis Dihlawī, explains further that he collected
all possible information about all such persons, beginning from the time of
Khwāja Muʿīnu’d-Dīn Ajmerī to the time of the writing of his book (tā tārīkh
kitābat īn kalimāt) with the help of books, treatises, and trustworthy narrators
(siqāt riwāt).70 It is strange, too, that none of these sources could yield any
information more than the accounts of five mystic women; it is also disap-
pointing that Muḥaddis Dihlawī shows no concern about this missing infor-
mation. As answers to these queries are not easy to come by, we are left with
a sad conclusion that Muḥaddis Dihlawī’s only worthwhile contribution is the
placing of Sufi women in an appendix to a compendium.
The tradition of Muḥaddis Dihlawī set the tone for all Sufi histories pro-
duced later in South Asia. Even Schimmel, a modern-day woman scholar
of Sufism, in her Mystical Dimensions of Islam (1975), despite her claim that

Urdu translation by Maulawī Subhān Maḥmūd and Maulawī Faẓl Akbar (Lahore: Akbar
Books, 2004) is easily available and the file can be downloaded.
69 AA, pp. 280–83.
70 AA, pp. 11–12.
74 Chapter 2

“names of women saints are found throughout the world of Islam, though only
few of them have been entered into official annals” dared not break the age-old
taboo of placing Sufi women in her main text. Emulating the decadent male
trend of transporting gendered secluded space to the world of scholarship, she
also could only add an appendix titled “The Feminine Element in Sufism.”71
It comes as a surprise that a person of the stature of Muḥammad Ṣādiq
Dihlawi Kashmiri Hamadānī in his kalimātu’s-ṣādiqīn, a hagiographical account
of 125 Sufis buried in Delhi up to the year 1023/1614, the year of the comple-
tion of his work, omits to mention any woman Sufi.72 Considering Muḥammad
Ṣādiq’s own statement that in compiling his work, which he describes as “an
account of the excellent and pious Sufis and friends [of Allāh]” (aḥwāl akhyār
wa abrār wa asfiyāʾ wa awliyāʾ) that were buried in Delhi, he borrowed (iqtibās
namūd) from earlier Sufi treatises, such as Akhbāru’l Akhyār, Fawāʾidu’l fuʾād,
Siyaru’l awliyāʾ, and Siyaru’l-ʿᾹrifīn, all of whom mention Sufi women buried
in Delhi, this omission comes as a surprise.73 The omission appears more fla-
grant as Muḥammad Ṣādiq was the favourite disciple of Muḥaddis Dihlawī,
who in his Akhbāru’l Akhyār included Sufi women, some of whom were buried
in Delhi and who, as Rizvi comments, trained Muḥammad Ṣādiq “to write bio-
graphical dictionaries.”74
Muḥammad Ghausī bin Ḥasan bin Mūsā Shaṭṭārī Māndawī’s completed
his Gulzār-i Abrār between 1014–1022/1605–1613, during the era of the Mughal
emperor Jahangir. The book was dedicated to the emperor and is considered
a major source for Sufis of the Shaṭtṭārī silsila.75 Among 612 Sufis whose lives
are recorded in this work, his treatment of the Sufi women is slightly better as
he includes accounts of near-contemporary women whose narratives were not
found in earlier sources.
Dārā Shikūh (1615–1659), the Mughal prince and a disciple of the Qādirī
Sufi, Miāṅ Mīr or Miyāṅ Jīv (d. 1045/1635), wrote a tazkira of the Sufis,

71 Annamarie Schimmel. 1975. Mystical Dimensions of Islam, pp. 426–435.

72 Muḥammad Ṣādiq Dihlawi Kashmiri Hamadānī. Kalimātu’s-ṣādiqīn. Edited by Muham-
mad Saleem Akhtar. Islamabad: Iran-Pakistan Research Centre, 1988.
73 Ibid, p. 2.
74 Saiyid Athar Abbas Rizvi. 2004. A History of Sufism in India, vol. 2. Lahore Suhail Acad-
emy, p. 23.
75 Muḥammad Ghausī Shaṭṭārī Māndawī, Gulzār-i Abrār (Urdu trans. Fazl Aḥmad Jūrī,
Azkār-i Abrār. 1975). Azkār-i abrār: Urdū tarjuma Gulzār-i abrār: Jahāngīr̄ ‘ahd kā ek
ghair maṭbūʿa tazkire ka nāyāb tarjuma. Lahore: Islamic Book Foundation. (The MS of
Gulzār-i Abrār has been edited by Yūsuf Bayg Bābāpūr, see Gulzār-i abrār fī siyaral-akhyār:
darsharḥ-iaḥvāl-i‘urafā va-mashāyikh-i Hind. Tihrān: Kitābkhānah, Mūzih va Markaz-i
Asnād-i Majlis-i Shūrā-i Islāmī, 2012). All references and translations in my work are from
its Urdu translation, Azkār-i Abrār.
The Sufi Texts 75

Safīnatu’l-Awliyāʾ in 1640.76 Bībī Jamāl Khātūn (d. 1057/1647), also known as

Bībī Jīv, the sister of Miyāṅ Jīv or Miyāṅ Mīr, is the only South Asian Sufi woman
mentioned in text. At the end of the text, Dārā has added a section under the
heading of zikr nisāʾ-yi ṭāḥirāt (An account of chaste/holy women) in which
he gives brief accounts of thirty-three women, divided in three sections under
separate headings. The first group, zikr azwāj-i Muṭharat (an account of the
holy wives of the Prophet), consists of an account of the wives of the Prophet;
the second section, banāt-i aṅ ḥaẓrat (daughters of the Prophet), is about the
four daughters of the Prophet; and the last one, zikr nisāʾ-yi al-ʿārifāt, presents
the life sketches of eighteen Sufi women. Bībī Jamāl Khātūn comes as the last
entry of this section.77 Dārā Shikūh wrote another Sufi biographical compen-
dium, Sakinatu’l Awliyāʾ, completed in 1052/1642, which is mainly a biography
of his Sufi mentor Miyān Mīr and his disciples.78 Contrary to the traditional
way of placing women’s narratives at the end of a book, as in Safīnatu’l Awliyāʾ,
in this book Dārā Shikūh adds Bībī Jamāl Khātūn’s notice right at the end of
Miyāṅ Mīr’s biographical sketch and before the beginning of the narratives of
his other disciples.79 An important feature of Dārā Shikūh’s work is the inclu-
sion of reliable chronology.
In 1049/1639 Jahān Ārāʾ Begum (1614–1681), the eldest and favourite child
of Shah Jahan, the Mughal emperor, and the elder sister of Dārā Shikūh,
after carefully consulting reliable works and treatises on taṣawwuf wrote
Mūnisu’l-arwaḥ, a biographical compendium of Chishtī Sufis.80 The writing
of Mūnisu’l-arwaḥ makes Jahān Ārāʾ Begum the first woman, and perhaps the
only woman, to compile Chishtī biographies. A little more than a year later,
on 27 Ramaẓān 1051/1641, Jahān Ārāʾ completed another Sufi treatise, Risālā-yi
ṣāḥibiyya. In this tract, Jahān Ārāʾ narrates her association with the Qādirī sil-
sila and her devotion to her Shaikh, Mullā Shah Badakhshī (1585–1661).81 This
significant work, despite its brevity, is the first autobiographical account of
any Sufi, whether male or female, to recount and narrate lived experiences.
An added value of this emotion-laden and passionately composed treatise is
the princely status of the author. No other woman member of a ruling family

76 Dārā Shikūh, Muḥammad. 1853. Safīnatu’l-awliyāʾ. Agra: Maṭbaʿ Madrasa Agra.

77 Ibid, pp. 371–372.
78 Dārā Shikūh, Muḥammad. Sakīnat’l-awliyāʾ (Urdu tarjuma). Lahore: Nawal Kishore Steam
Press, (n. d.).
79 Ibid, pp. 101–102.
80 Jahān Ārāʾ Begum. Mūnisu’l-arwaḥ. Translated in Urdu by Maulawī Muḥammad
ʿAbduṣ-Ṣamad Kalīm Qādirī. Dehli: Matbāʿ Rizvi, 1891.
81 Jahān Ārāʾ Begum. Risāla-i ṣāḥābiyā with Persian text and Urdu and English translation by
Muhammad Aslam and Sardar Ali Ahmad Khan. Lahore: Ashraf Printing Press, 1993.
76 Chapter 2

of Hindustan except Jahān Ārāʾ has written an account of her enrollment in a

Sufi silsila.
Another compendium of the South Asian Sufis, Jawāhir-i Farīdī appeared
in 1623 while Jahangir still had a good hold over his empire. Authored by
ʿAlī Asghar Chishtī to commemorate the glories of Shaikh Faridu’d-Dīn
Ganj-i Shakkar and his descendants, the book refers to the three daughters
of the Shaikh which he writes with reference to the earlier narrative of Amīr
Khwurd.82 Biographical notices for other Sufi women are missing in this work.
Mirāt-ul Asrār of ʿAbdu’l-Raḥmān Chishtī (d. 1683), completed sometime after
1045/1635, in its twenty-three sections gives notices of Indian Sufis as well as
of Sufis from regions outside India. Sufi women do not get any reference in
the book.83
A biographical compendium, Akbāru’l awliyāʾ min lisānu’l aṣfiyāʾ (Tales
of friends of God as a tribute to the holy persons), was probably completed
in 1077/1666–1667 in Aurangabad, Deccan by Shaikh Ghulām Muʿīnu’d-Dīn
ʿAbdu’llah (known as al-Khalīfa al-Kheshgī al-Chishtī). Kheshgī had served
in various capacities under Mughal nobles, and his book significantly covers
the life accounts of Pashtun women.84 Kheshgī was a devout Chishtī and had
inherited an excellent library from his father which helped him pursue his
literary career, in addition to his employment under various Mughal nobles.85
Tracing his community’s devotional connection with the Chishtīs, Kheshgī
writes that his community of Afghan Pashtūn descent arrived in Qaṣūr, Punjab
(Pakistan), along with their spiritual leader, Shaikh Watto Shoryānī, reverently
addressed as Pīr Kabār (the great teacher) (d. 550/1155), who was a Khalīfa of
Ḥaẓrat Maudūd Chishtī (d. 1181–1182).86 Out of 162 mystics in the manuscript

82 ʿAlī Asghar Chishtī. Fihrist Kiatb Jawāhir-i Farīdī. Lahore: Victoria Press, 1301/1884. pp. 352,
354–358. Henceforth, referred to as Fihrist Kiatb Jawāhir-i Farīdī. (For Urdu translation by
Fazlu’d-Dīn Naqshbandi Mujaddid, see Jawāhir-i Farīdī yāʿnī Tazkirā-i Farīdī. Pakpattan:
Maktabā Bābā Farīd (n. d.))
83 Chishtī, ʿAbdu’l-Raḥmān, and Wāḥid Bakhsh Siyāl. 1982. Mirʾātu’l asrār: qadīm o ghair
maṭbūʿa tazkira-i Ṣūfiyya kā awwālīn Urdū tarjuma. Lahore: Sufi Foundation.
84 ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī. 1077/1666–6. Akbāru’l awliyāʾ min lisānu’l aṣfiyyāʾ (Tales of friends
of God as a tribute to the pure ones), MS. no. R343, Iqbal Mujaddidī Collection, Punjab
University, Lahore. Fols. 123b, 124a. (Henceforth, referred to as Akbāru’l awliyāʾ).
85 See Muhammad Iqbal Mujaddidī’s biography of Kheshgī, Aḥwāl wa asār ʿAbdullah Kheshgī
Qasūri (Lahore: Dāru’l Muarrikhīn, 1972).
86 For a short biographical note on Pīr Kabār Shaikh Watto Shoryānī, see Kheshgī’s
Maʿāriju’l wilāyat (MS. No.314 Panjab University (Lahore) library, in the collection of Iqbal
Mujaddidi, fol. 540 b. Kheshgī addresses Shoryānī as Quṭbu’l Quṭṭāb (Quṭb is the highest
rank in the saintly hierarchy, thus the rank of Quṭbu’l Quṭṭāb goes much higher; also, see
Mufti Ghulām Sarwar Lahorī. 1290/1873. Khazīnatu’l Asfiyyā. Lucknow: Maṭbaʿ Samar-i
Hind, pp. 435–454 (henceforth, as Khazīnatu’l Asfiyyā).
The Sufi Texts 77

of Akbāru’l awliyāʾ,87 eleven are women from the Kheshgī-Afghan community

of Qaṣūr. In his introductory comments to chapter three, entitled dar bayān
aḥwāl nisā ʿārifāt kheshgiān wa sāʾir-i Afghanān (An account of pious women
of the Kheshgīs and travellers [of the Path] from the Afghans), Kheshgī notes
that as this work, particularly the section on women mystics, was written while
Kheshgī was away from his books in Qaṣūr, he had to recall his memory. Indeed,
he did this job exceedingly well and thus left for us a record which is incom-
parable and unique. We are indebted to Kheshgī for narrating the stories of
Afghan/Pashtūn women who otherwise are not assessed for their saintly gains.
Kheshgī’s brief but highly significant statement about the notices of saintly
women, though comprising only a few short narratives is worth quoting here.
Kheshgī says, “Let it be not concealed that among the community (qaum) of
the Kheshgīs, there had been numerous (bisyār guzashta and) saintly women.
However, while writing in Aurangabad with little facilities and where rich
historical narratives are difficult (qillat-i riwāt) to get, I had to be contented
with this [brief account] to show that the community of the Kheshgīs is not
void of the blessings and the bounties (az tayammun wa tabarruk) of virtuous
women.”88
On 24 Rajab 1094/1683 in Aurangabad, ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī, after consult-
ing several sources, including malfūzāt, some of which are extinct or lost now,
completed Maʿāriju’l wilāyat89 (Spread of Sufism), another treasure house of
hagiographical biographies of the Chishtīs, whom he describes as khwajgān-i
Chisht ahl-i bihisht (the [Sufi] Masters of Chisht—the people of Heaven).90
Kheshgī’s purpose in compiling the biographies was not merely to write down
memoirs of the pious; he compiled these narratives because the tales of the
exalted teach morals. Thus, he wrote that the travellers of the Path (sālik), by
the blessings of reading the accounts of the Sufis (az barkat-i muṭalaʿ aḥwāl),
would learn to seek ṭarīq-i waṣūl (the way of seeking union [with the Divine]).91

87 For details about the holdings of the MS, see Aḥwāl wa asār ʿAbdullah Kheshgī Qasūri,
pp. 77–79.
88 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fol. 127b.
89 At two different places, introduction (fol. b) and later in fol. 655b, Kheshgī mentions addi-
tional titles of the book, elucidating its contents further—Maʿāriju’l wilāyat fi madāriju’l
hidānā (spread of Sufism for taking steps towards peace), Maʿāriju’l wilāyat fi madāriju’l
aṣfiyāʾ (spread of Sufism and the grandeur of the Sufis), and muabshshirāt aḥwāl-i iltifāt
(exhilarating accounts of the magnanimities [of the Sufis]).
90 Maʿāriju’l wilāyat remains in manuscript form with copies held at various universities.
I have consulted the MS (no. R344) in the Punjab University (Lahore) library, in the collec-
tion of Iqbal Mujaddidi (zakhīrā Iqbal Mujaddidi). This manuscript, according to a date
given on the last page, was copied on 25 Rabiʿus Sānī, 1111/ October 20, 1699.
91 Maʿāriju’l wilāyat, fol.1b.
78 Chapter 2

In concluding his work, Kheshgī hoped that his readers would be immensely
pleased and delighted ( farḥat wa rāḥat) by his work.92 In the context of my
study, the importance of Maʿāriju’l wilāyat is that it documents the lives of
nine pious women, from the time of Bībī Sāra93 to the time of the compilation
of Maʿāriju’l wilāyat. In the last chapter (rukn), titled bʿaẓ majāzīb wa nisāʾ-yi
ʿārifāt (some enraptured Sufis and gnostic women), these stories of Pashtūn
women are given.94
Narratives of Pashtūn and women of Afghan ancestry reveal that they exer-
cised far more power in their mundane lives and domestic affairs as well as
in their religious, spiritual, and scholarly pursuits than is generally believed.
Their role as mystics who taught and instructed men as well, indeed reflects
their role as agents of social development by diffusing misogynist attitudes
held towards women.
Khwāja Niʿmatu’llah bin Khwāja Ḥabību’llah al-Harāwi’s Tārīkh-i khānjahānī
wa Makhzan-i Afghānī, which he completed in 1612 during the age of the
Mughal emperor Jahangir (r. 1605–1627), is another source providing authorita-
tive accounts of Pashtun Sufi women. Some of these women are also included
in Kheshgī’s works.95
At the close of the eighteenth century another valuable biographical com-
pendium, Bahr-e Zakhkhār (the rising ocean), including about 2,800 Sufis,
mostly from Hindustan, was compiled by Shaikh Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf Awadhi
of Lucknow. Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf, a mystic, used to spend hours and days in
the company of Sufis and pious persons. Bahr-e Zakhkhār is divided into eight
parts. The last part, named dar aḥwāl-i nisāʾ (an account of women), out of
69 biographical notices on women, 23 are the accounts of women mystics of
India. Of these 23, several are mentioned for the first time in any text.96
In Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyyāʾ, a biographical compendium of the Sufis, Ghulām
Sarwar Lahorī (d. 1307/1890) followed the pattern earlier set by Muḥaddis
Dihlawi of placing women Sufis’ notices at the end of his work. In chapter 7
of Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyyāʾ, Lahorī presents lives of pious Muslim women, from

92 Ibid, fol. 655a.

93 See her biographical notice in Part 2 of this book.
94 Maʿāriju’l wilāyat, fols. 651–53.
95 Khwāja Niʿmatu’llah bin Khwāja Ḥabību’llah al-Harāwi’s Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa
Makhzan-i Afghānī, vol. 2, (Dhaka: Asiatic society of Pakistan (1962)), (henceforth, referred
to as Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī).
96 Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf. Bahr-e-Zakhkhar. (Edited) Azarmi Dukht Safavi. 2012. Bahr-e
Zakhkhar, Critical Edition with Introduction and Notes (vol. 3). Aligarh: Institute of Persian
Research, Aligarh Muslim University (Originally composed in 1788–89) (henceforth,
referred to as Bahr-e Zakhkhar).
The Sufi Texts 79

the time of the Prophet to the days of the author.97 Lahorī also published
another book in 1875, Ḥadīqatu’l Awliyāʾ (Walled Garden of the Saints), a valu-
able source for introducing the reader to Sufi saints of the Punjab, some of
whom are now little known to a modern-day scholar. Under the section titled
ʿAurāt ṣalihāt kē zikr meiṅ jo Punjāb meiṅ guzar chukī haiṅ (In praise of righ-
teous women who lived in the Punjab), this book describes the life and deeds
of fifteen Sufi women. While some of the stories are based on oral traditions
and legends, others are borrowed from earlier sources.98 In 1194/1780, Shaikh
Muḥammad ʿĀzam Thattawī’ wrote Tuḥfatu’l-ṭāhirīn, describing scholars and
saints of Sindh. This work is a valuable source of information for a few Sufi
women of Sindh that are included in this work.99
With the conquest of the states in the Deccan peninsula under the Sultanate
of Delhi, a new wave of Sufism emerged there which had a unique mix of local
norms with the incoming influences of the Muslims of Delhi Sultanate. In the
late eighteenth and early nineteenth century, South India saw a proliferation of
book writing. Among the large number of texts produced there, some had spe-
cial references to Sufi women. Muḥammad Ibraḥīm Qādirī Shaṭṭārī Bijāpurī, in
his Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, written in 1241/1825, following the customary
tradition added a section about pious women at the end of the book. However,
in a departure from the norm, instead of naming this section “an account of
the pious and chaste women” (ʿābidāt wa ṣāliḥāt), he titled it “an account of
the Sufis of Bijapur who are in the category of women” (zikr awliyāʾ-yi zumra-
yi niswāṅ Bijāpur). Thus, by naming the section as such, Muḥammad Ibraḥīm
Qādirī broke the custom of recognising women only as pious women and not
specifically naming them as Sufis. Thus, Qādirī recognized these pious women
not just as ʿābidāt wa ṣāliḥāt or merely as pious women; he categorised these
women as awliyāʾ.100
Mirza Mehdi Shirazi in 1886 published a biographical compendium in
Persian of 288 women from around the Muslim cultures since the days of the
Prophet. This book spread over just 178 pages, under a highly ornate title, Kitāb
tazkiratu’l-khwātīn dar sharaḥ-i ḥāl- i mashāhīr-i niswān-i ʿālam az ʿArab wa
Rūm wa Hind wa ʿAjam az ṣadr-i Islām (The biographies of women describing

97 Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyāʾ, jild dom, pp. 397–429.

98 Ḥadīqatu’l Awliyāʾ: Punjāb ke Akābīr Sufīyāʾ kā Mustanad Tazkir, pp. 235–243.
99 Shaikh Muḥammad ʿĀzam Thattawī, 1956. Ṭuḥfatu’l ṭahirīn. (Edited by Badr-i ʿAlam
Durrani). Karachi: Sindhi Adabi Board.
100 Muḥammad Ibraḥīm Qādirī Shaṭṭārī Bijāpurī. 1241/1825. Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur.
(Translated in Urdu by Shah Saifullah Qādirī Shaṭṭārī Sibghat Allāhī in 1314/1896 under
the title-Tarjuma-yi Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur). (Urdu lithograph. Henceforth, referred
to Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur). Raichūr: Sibghat Allāhī Press, pp. 222–26.
80 Chapter 2

the virtues and the qualities of famous women from Rome to Persia and from
the beginning of Islam to this day found in Farsi and Turki [languages]). In
addition to the noble women of the Prophet’s family, only two are about
women mystics, Rāʿbia Baṣari and Haft ʿAfifā of Sindh. The book was a transla-
tion of an earlier Turkish work by Mehmed Zihni Effendi published in 1877
under the title kitāb-i Meşahirün-nisa from Istanbul.101 The importance of the
book lies in the translator’s new introduction in which he commented that
women and men have equal rights.102

2.8.3 Ḥaẓrat Amīr Khusraw: Poetic Imagery or a Patriarchal Frame

Another source, which although it does not fall into the above category of
sources is still of prime significance, is the writings of Amīr Khusraw (1253–
1325). His poetic compositions, which are neither of the category of malfūzāt
nor tazkirāt, portray the generally accepted reality of women’s lives of the
period of early Chishtī development. Khusraw’s writings, which are discussed
here, thus help us in understanding why Sufi women remain veiled in Sufi dis-
courses and texts.
Amīr Khusraw, a mystical poet of superb imagination and a Sufi of great
merit, spent his days and nights in the company of his spiritual mentor, Khwāja
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ.103 There is strong likelihood that his poems must have
been read, if not entirely, by Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyā’. Amīr Khwurd in
Siyaru’l-awliyāʾ writes that it was a practice of Amīr Khusraw that on comple-
tion of each of his books, he would present it to the Sulṭānu’l Mashāʾikh, who
would place his hand on it and bless it. Often, he would read a few lines of it
and give his comments.104 Indeed, the Khwāja’s affection and appreciation for
Amīr Khusraw was so intense that twice he told him that he gets disturbed
by others (man az hama tang āyam), but not by Khusraw.105 Khusraw had
two unique distinctions. First, the Khwāja placed his special kulāh (headgear)
on the head of Khusraw by his own hands. Second, he was complimented by
Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, who composed and recited two couplets, saying

101 Mehmed Zihni Effendi.1877. Meşahir ün-nisa. [Istanbul]: Darul Tibaa ul-Amire. (As I have
not studied or consulted this book, I have not included it in the bibliography).
102 Mirza Mehdi Shirāzī. 1889. Kitāb-i tazkirat’al-khawātīn dar shraḥ-i ḥāl mashāhīr-i niswān-i
ʿalam (Place of publication not known, probably Bombay), p. 2.
103 For a well-researched biography of Khusraw, see Muhammad Wahid Mirza. 1929. Amīr
Khusraw: Ṭūṭi-yi Hind Ḥaẓrat Hind Ḥaẓrat Amīr Khusraw Dihlawī ke ḥālāt-i zindagi aur
unki taṣnīfāt par ek tanqīdi nazr. Allahabad: Hindustan Academy.
104 SA, p. 302.
105 Ibid, p. 302.
The Sufi Texts 81

that there is hardly anyone who is equivalent to Khusraw’s excellence in prose

and poetry.106
Khusraw counselled his own daughter twice, in 698/1298 in his longer
poem in Farsi, Maṭlaʿ ʿul-anwār (The beginning of new light) and in 701/1301 in
Hasht Bihisht (The eighth heavens), which is a set of twenty-one longer poems
(masāwī).107 In Maṭlaʿ ul- anwār, Khusraw gives advice to his veiled daughter108
and to women of all ages, young and old (dar nasīḥat-i farzand-i mastūra wa
sāʾir-i mastūrāt jawān wa zāl), on their moral conduct.109
Indeed, Khusraw went to the length of telling women in his Maṭlaʿ ul-anwār
that they should remain confined in their homes to the extent of tying their
legs to their skirt (pā-yi bā zanjīrā -yi dāman-i khwesh).110 Insisting on women’s
nonvisibility, Khusraw says that they should not even expose their faces to the
sun and the moon.111 Khusraw dedicated his second masāwī, Hasht Bihisht, to
the reigning Sultan, ʿAlāʾud-Dīn Khilji (r. 1296–1316).112 One of the poems of this
collection, Naṣiḥat farzand-i bihishtī samartu’l fuʾād ʿafīfā (Counsel for the vir-
tuous daughter, fruit of heart, bestowed by the Heaven), is addressed to his own
young daughter, his first child whom he loved dearly.113 In Khusraw’s words,
this poem is a manifesto (dastūr) for the upbringing of little girls into submis-
sive, dutiful wives to please their husbands, even if the husband is erratic (be
parhaiz). The poet expresses a dichotomy that rules supreme in South Asia
regarding women: a father loves his daughter’s beautiful face, shining like a
full moon (roshnī chūṇ māh chahārdah ruz), but regrets that she is born a girl

106 Ibid, p. 304.

107 Saiyyid Sulaimān Ashraf. 1336/1918. Masnawī Hasht Bihisht. Aligarh: Maṭbaʿ Institute
Gazette, p. 170.
108 Khusraw had only one daughter, his eldest child, and three sons. The daughter remains
anonymous in his poetry. However, Wahid Mirza identifies her as Maimūna, see
Mohammad Wahid Mirza. The Life and Works of Amir Khusrau. Calcutta: Baptist Mission
Press, 1935, p. 195. Mastūra (from the word mastūr, which means concealed or veiled,
hence here it means the veiled daughter). Similarly, ʿAfīfā in Naṣiḥat farzand-i bihishtī
is not the name of his daughter but the quality of his daughter implying the chaste one.
For his children, see Muḥammad Saʿīd Aḥmad Marharwī. 1321/1903. Ḥayāt Khusraw. Agra:
Maṭba῾ Akbarī, p. 70. Sunil Sharma in his Amir Khusraw: The Poet of Sultans and Sufis
(Oxford: Oneworld, 2005, p. 33.), Sunil Sharma in his Amir Khusraw: The Poet of Sultans
and Sufis (Oxford: Oneworld, 2005, p. 33.), however, writes that he had two daughters,
named Mastūra and ʿAfīfā.
109 Amīr Khusraw. 1334/1926. Maṭlaʿ ul-anwār, ed. Muḥammad Muqtadā Khan Sherwāni.
Aligarh: Muslim University Press, pp. 222–230.
110 Ibid, p. 224.
111 Ibid, p. 228.
112 Muḥammad Sāʿīd Aḥmad Marharwī. 1321/1903. p. 98.
113 Amīr Khusraw. 1290/1873. Hasht Bihisht. Lucknow: Maṭbaʿ Nawal Kishore, pp. 21–25.
82 Chapter 2

and wishes her to die instead of remaining alive to suffer the ignominies that
women were to suffer.114 Expecting his underage (gar chih khurd) daughter, not
yet capable of understanding (be tamīz) but who would reach adulthood one
day (rūz-i ākhir buzurg), Khusraw counsels her that to become virtuous (pārsā
bāsh), she should first submit to God. She must make efforts to suppress all
urges of young age (koshish kazz kushtan-i jawāni) and should be like a dead
person towards all such emotions. If her husband is not a virtuous person, she
should take refuge in Allāh. She should remain hidden behind four curtains (az
pas-i chār parda). Instead of peeping through the holes (rauzan), even if the
hole is as narrow as the eye of a needle (chashm-yisozān), the virtuous woman
must sit facing the wall, with her back turned toward the doorway (rū ba dīwār
wa pusht bar dar kun). If someone knocks at the door, she should not open the
door, even if the person at the door is someone like Khizr, the prophet of Allāh.
A woman who roams around the alleys (kūchā) is a bitch (māda-i sag) and not
a woman (zan na bashad). The best vocation for a virtuous woman is sewing
and spinning (sozan wa dūk neza tīr ast) which is [equal to men’s use of] spear
and arrow. Finally, Khusraw, comforting his daughter, prays that her headscarf
(miqnaʿt) may turn into her crown and hat (āfīsar wa kulāh).
Khusraw’s Naṣiḥat farzand-i bihishtī certainly raises some critical ques-
tions regarding the image of girls and women. Most male scholars argue that
Khusraw’s only purpose by giving this advice to his daughter was to shield her
and by extension other women of India from a life of abuse and exploitation.
Ashraf comments that Khusraw was not lamenting (andūhgīn) the birth of a
daughter; his purpose was to reform the people.115 Shujaʿ Munʿmi offers similar
arguments.116 Ansari presents another argument projecting Khusraw’s sincer-
ity for women’s cause and writes that Khusraw’s sentiments for women reflect
a mother’s affection for her children.117 Thus, more than Khusraw, his present-
day admirers and biographers ring alarm bells by magnifying Khusraw’s views
about women being in the interest of women. In view of Amīr Khwurd’s tes-
timony that Khusraw’s compositions were seen, approved, and appreciated
by Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, deeper concerns emerge regarding the Sufi
perception of women. It also raises critical questions about Sufi expectations
about women’s role in the society.

114 Ibid, pp. 21–25. Maulānā Sayyid Sulaiman Ashraf. Hasht-Bihisht [The Eighth Heaven],
(ʿAligaŕh: Maṭbāʿ Insitute Gazette, 1918).
115 Saiyyid Sulaimān Ashraf. 1975.‘Hasht Bihisht.’ In Amir Khusraw: Aḥwāl wa Āsār. Edited by
Nurul Hasan Ansari. Delhi: Kohinoor Press, pp. 159–176.
116 F.M. Shujāʿ Munʿmi. Ḥaẓrat Amīr Khusraw Dihlawi kī betī ke nām naṣīḥat. Bhawalpur:
F.M. Shujāʿ 1929.
117 Z. Ansari. 1977. Khusraw kā Zahanī Safar. Delhi: Anjuman Taraqqi-yi Urdu, pp. 54–55.
The Sufi Texts 83

2.9 Shrines: A Source for the Study of Sufi Women

As discussed above, the Sufi malfūzāt and tazkirāt originate from the spoken
word and are based on the oral authority of the traditions. Thus, these texts
validate and also sanctify the word as an authentic source of knowledge and
scholarship. Oral tales that circulate at the shrines, therefore, deserve to be
heard, accepted, and assessed within this background of the genesis of Sufi lit-
erature. In addition to their significance as a place where oral traditions origi-
nate, and are sustained and nurtured through devotees’ narratives, Sufi shrines
and mausoleums are pieces of funerary architecture. These structures often
carry inscriptions and house treasured manuscripts and other relevant texts,
in addition to artefacts. As shrine management traditionally runs through the
families of the saints, the gaddī nishīṅ, (literally, “one who sits on a seat”), or the
successors of the dead saint, often act as custodians of oral traditions.
In the case of Sufi women, their shrines also act as an alternative for the
missing or suppressed written evidence. More importantly, a woman Sufi’s
shrine, particularly if the Sufi woman is not known through historical texts,
often symbolises her presence. Biographical notices in this book confirm that
some Sufi women were identified on the basis of archaeological evidence and
historical inscriptions found on their shrines. In addition, in societies where
women of all classes and status are marginalised, an edifice commemorating a
woman speaks volumes.
Most shrines of women suffer from neglect. Bashīruddīn Aḥmad in his
Wāqiʿāt Dāru’l Ḥukūmat Dehli (Information about Delhi, the capital city)
lamented the neglect of old graves and burial places in Delhi. Neglect led to
vandalisation of masonry material, particularly inscription tablets, thus eras-
ing valuable historical evidence.118 The post-1857 acts of vengeance by the
colonial administration fell brutally hard on cultural and religious icons of the
country. A revealing example is the confiscation by the colonial government
of Shah Fahkhru’d-Dīn’s land in Delhi, which was a property in the name of
his grandson Ḥazrat Ghulām Naṣiru’d-Dīn alias Kāley Ṣāḥib (d. 1262/1846).119
Similarly, the khānqah of Shah Kalīmu’llah was razed to the ground; only the

118 Bashīruddīn Aḥmad. 1337/1918. Waqiʿāt Dāru’l Ḥukūmat Dehli (ḥiṣṣā duʾm) (Reprint Urdu
Academy, Delhi, 1990. Henceforth, referred to as Wāqiʿāt Dāru’l Ḥukūmat Dehli.), p. 518.
119 Shāh Fahkhru’d-Dīn Dihlawī. Malfūzāt wa ḥālāt Shāh Fahkhru’d-Dīn Dihlawī (Urdu
translation of Fakhru’l Ṭālibīn wa Manāqib-i Fakhariyā by Mīr Nazar ʿAlī Dard Kakorwī)
Karachi; Salman Academy, 1961, p. 26; For an account of Ḥazrat Ghulām Naṣiru’d-Dīn
alias Kāley Ṣāḥib’, see Sir Syed Ahmed Khan’s Āsāruʾs Sanādīd, (Chapter Four). Lucknow:
Maṭbaʿ Nawal Kishore, 1293/1876, p. 21. (First published in 1847).
84 Chapter 2

grave remained there.120 We can surmise that this must have been the fate of
shrines of women as well. Indeed, some women-only shrines, particularly of
those pious women who had no known or viable affiliation with a Sufi silsila,
must have fallen into oblivion by sheer neglect. No such record was maintained.
Examples of such lost treasures due to human neglect, compounded by
nature’s ravages, continue to abound, astounding in terms of quantity and
quality. The graveyard of Makli, which once consisted of thousands of graves
with inscriptions, is one such example illustrating human neglect, plunder,
and pillage. They commemorate the name of Māʾī Maklī, a woman saint long
since forgotten. Her grave exists today, though in a highly neglectful state, only
because the poor and needy people, who are victims of similar neglect, keep
visiting her. Like libraries put to ashes by rogues, negligence by the corrupt is
physically erasing the shrines. Another eye-opening example is the poor con-
servation of the tomb-structure of Bībī Jawindi’s shrine at Uchch. Although
some efforts for the restoration of Bībī Jawindi’s shrine at Uchch is reported,
major portions are completely lost. During my visit of the shrine, I was numbed
to see the poor quality of work that was underway there. Since its reported
ruinous condition by Mohan Lal almost two hundred years ago, the condi-
tion of the shrine has worsened.121 It is to be noted that this shrine is the only
known historical evidence of Bībī Jawindī. Scholars lament the loss of valuable
books, the mishandling of manuscripts by novices in the archives, and wrong
cataloguing of archival material by careless librarians. There is always the hope
that another copy of a lost or damaged manuscript might appear some other
place. A shrine lost once, is lost forever. An inscription erased once, cannot be
replaced by another one. An example from which much can be learned is of
the damaged shrine of Hasti Bībī, a chance discovery in the late nineteenth
century during excavation near the old fort in Ahmadabad.
Shrines, graves, and mausoleums, with or without inscriptions, are impor-
tant sources leading to further historical investigations. Their architectural
remains, similar to manuscript texts, need careful preservation and conserva-
tion. Much appreciable work in this regard was undertaken under the aegis of

120 Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghālib. 1895. Urdu-i Muʿallā. (Letter to Ḥakīm Saiyyid Ahmad Hasan
Maudūdi dated September 1, 1866, pp. 202–203). Dehli: Maṭba῾ Mujtabāʾī; Mirza Asadullah
Khan Ghālib. 1929; Ood-i Hindi [ʿŪd-i hindi] (Letter no. 46 to Nawab Anwāru’d-Daula,
pp. 93–95): Allahabad: Ram Narain Lal, Beni Madho; Najmu᾽d-Dīn Sulaimānī. Manāqibu᾽l
Maḥbūbīn (Urdu translation by Iftikhar Ahmad Chishtī). Faisalabad: Chistiyya Academy,
1987. (First published in 1278/1861, Maṭba῾ Muḥammadi Lahore), p. 120.
121 Mohan Lal, Munshi, 1836. ‘Description of Uch-Sahrif.’ The Journal of the Asiatic Society of
Bengal, Vol. 5, (Edited by John Prinscep, Calcutta: Printed at the Baptist Mission Press),
pp. 796–99.
The Sufi Texts 85

the colonial administration of South Asia, once their fury over the 1857 debacle
had calmed down. These efforts resulted in large field surveys and rich docu-
mentation of old buildings, secular as well as religious. The twelfth-century
Sufi, Bībī Kamāl of Kako (in Bihar, India), was the first to be introduced to
the modern-day audience by Cunningham’s archaeological survey report in
the late nineteenth century. Similarly, Mukkā Bī of Bidar emerged as a Sufi of
merit not from the pages of a book but from a chance discovery by Ghulam
Yazdani when he uncovered an inscription about her which remains our only
source of knowledge about her. However, lack of consistency in making such
efforts, the absence of skilled and trained conservators, and vandalism and sys-
tematic plunder of material at these monuments, has left us bereft of valuable
evidence.
Interestingly, the shrines also reflect the gendered nature of our society. All
shrines where Sufi women are buried and where women go to make their offer-
ings and pray do not fall into the usual image of a shrine, with a dome, cupola,
and a majestic facade. Some shrines dedicated to the memories of women may
consist of niches in a wall where a small earthen oil lamp is burnt. Women of
the neighbourhood manage this niche-shrine, contribute a little money for its
oil and wick (diyā-battī), paint, and flower wreaths.
In most towns and cities, one would come across what Bayly describes
as “tiny wayside shrines.” Curiously, a good number of these commemorate
women saints whose history is largely forgotten and only preserved through
oral traditions and legends. Little effort is made to explore the history of those
reposed in these graves, some of which have humble appearance, similar to
those who flock there to seek redress of social wrongs; others have modest to
impressive architecture and other paraphernalia. Whether humble or sublime
in appearance, all are held in great devotion by hundreds and thousands of
women for whom the ziyārat is seeing the pious person.
The etiquette of shrine visitation is similar to the adāb of a murīd in the
presence of a living Sufi. Indeed, a Sufi is not a dead person. Similar to the futūḥ
is the nazrāna that each woman devotee offers at the shrine. At the shrines
of Makli, I saw live fowl, home-bred eggs, and roasted sweetcorn brought by
the poor folk as a version of a modern-day futūḥ. Next comes greeting the pīr
or the Sufi. Each devotee first offers salutation to the buried Sufi, by saying it
loudly. As they step in, they touch the wall of the shrine, the doorway or the
meshed railing of the grave, with the same respect which is due to a living Sufi.
The shrine thus personifies the Sufi. Similar to a living Sufi, the buried Sufi
guides and commands the believing devotee. At the shrine of Nūrī Bābā at
Tin Hatti, Karachi, a woman devotee related a family history of shrine visita-
tion. She said her father-in-law was a murid of Ḥāji Ghāʾib Shah of Keamari, in
86 Chapter 2

Karachi. When she fell ill, instead of visiting Ḥāji Ghāʾib Shah of Keamari, she
went to the Nūrī Bābā because Nūrī Bābā appeared in her dream. She did not
know about him before. In her dream, he introduced himself and ordered her
(bishārat huʾī, Bābā ne ḥukm diyā) to visit him. As she didn’t go to Keamari, Ḥāji
Ghāʾib Shah of Keamari got angry with her. Nūrī Bābā told her about this anger
and also ordered her to visit Keamari to seek forgiveness. The visit brought her
relief from her ailment. Now, for thanksgiving, Nūrī Bābā has ordered her to
visit his shrine on foot on seven consecutive Thursdays. When I met her, it was
the fourth of these seven Thursdays. All through her conversation with me,
the woman was narrating the events in her dreams as if they had happened
in reality.
Women devotees believe that the buried Sufi listens to them and communi-
cates with them. I heard women addressing the buried Sufi, with folded hands,
saying, “I appeal to you” (main āp se faryād kartī hūn). A significant aspect of
Sufi women’s shrines is that most of these women are addressed as Mother.
Instead of awe-inspiring and authoritarian modes of address, as Yā Shaikh or
Dātā, the sufi women are addressed as Ma, Māʾī, or Amma, thus the most natu-
ral bond, the cordial bond, is established.
Indeed, the devotees and shrine visitors, some regular in their attendance
at the shrine, represent another category of silsila that as yet remains uniden-
tified. These devotees were not initiated into the silsila. Indeed, a silsila with
which we are familiar and which had distinguishing ways of dress and living,
is not the women’s way of Sufism. These unnamed silsilas witnessed on the
premises of the shrines are akin to oceans where all waters come together, and
yet have their own identity.
My visits to women’s shrines in the major cities of Pakistan show the tenacity
of oral traditions that are transferred through the channel of memory from one
generation of women to the next. These oral narratives, as Nile Green refers to
them, are “living narratives”122 and through them the saints—in the context of
this study, women saints—interact in the daily lives of the devotees. The story
of Māʾī Mirāṅ or Mirāṅ Pīr of Karachi does not appear in any recorded his-
tory, either in the Sufi narratives or in any other text. Even the colonial admin-
istrators are silent about her presence. The government of Sindh, however,
through its Auqaf Department, manages this shrine and collects cash offer-
ings (nazrānā) that are deposited by the devotees in the green-coloured locked
cash boxes kept at the shrine. The ʿurs celebrations are also attended or at least
managed by this governmental agency. Thus, through bureaucratic control,

122 Nile Green. 2004. “Stories of Saints and Sultan: Re-membering History at the Sufi Shrine
of Aurangabad.” Modern Asian Studies, 82 (2): 419–446.
The Sufi Texts 87

the shrine’s presence is legitimised. During my interviews of women visitors

and shrine attendants at the shrines of Māʾī Mirāṅ in Karachi, the shrine of
Bībīāṅ Pak Damāṅ̇ in Lahore, and Shah Parioṅ jo Āstānā in Thatta, to cite a few
examples from a long list of such shrines of women, I was amazed at the details
they narrated about the lives and miraculous powers of these pious women.
More fascinating is that at all my visits to these shrines, which are several years
apart from each other, the narratives remained the same, though the narrators
changed. Thus, these repeated oral narratives add credibility to the accounts
and legitimize the saints’ authority. At each of my visits, I heard tales of the
women saints’ powers of healing and curing ailments which the physicians
had rejected as cases beyond cure (daktar ne jawāb dediya tha).
Thus, one can draw the comparison between the historical evasion of Sufi
women and the apathy shown towards the shrines of these women today. There
is even now a condemnation of women’s shrine visitation as a sacrilegious act,
and there continues to be deep-rooted doubt about the religious importance
and intellect of these pious women of the past.
 Chapter 3

The Sufi Gaze: Perception of Women by Male Sufis

The first treatise written in Persian on taṣawwuf, the Kashfu᾽l Maḥjūb

(Uncovering the Veiled), by Abu’l Ḥasan ʿAlī bin ʿUsmān al-Hujwīrī (d. between
456/1063–1064 or 465–469/1037–1077), in addition to its avowed purpose that
the readers “may find their way to spiritual reality,” also revealed gendered
perceptions of male Sufis about the spiritual merits and worth of women
friends of God. Hujwīrī’s views on women as the source of chaos and disorder
remain a popularly approved dogmatic and social perception of women. The
historic process of the growth of taṣawwuf in South Asia and its transforma-
tion from a ṭarīq/ṭarīqa (path) seeking Divine proximity (qurb) to a chain or
order (silsila) with genealogies (shajra), all displaying male presence, has cat-
egorised women as devotees and followers and not as leaders. Consequent to
the emergence and consolidation of khānqāhs (Sufi lodges), women’s presence
in Sufism turned into that of mere bystanders, often physically debarred from
crossing the sacred thresholds and entering the sanctuaries.
In his introduction to Nizami’s Tārīkh Mashāʾikh-i Chisht, Mohammad
Habib comments that the Chishtī Sufis, contrary to the extreme abhorrence
for women found in medieval literature and in public view in general, viewed
them with great respect. Elucidating his point further, Mohammad Habib,
whose writings of history acquired “a more Marxist colouring,”1 makes a con-
flicting observation that “a woman could not attain the rank of a shaikh; how-
ever, gender discrimination of any type definitely was not there. Women were
respected.”2 In support of his argument, Habib cited two observations of Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ regarding women of saintly virtues and about the irrel-
evance of gender distinction. In his discourse held in Ghiyāspur, his khānqah,
on the 27th of Jamādīʾul ākhir, 708/1308, Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ first said that
“dervishes who ask saintly women and saintly men to intercede on their behalf,
remember saintly women first because they are so rare.” He then commented

1 Muzaffar Alam and Sanjay Subrahmanyam. 2012. Writing the Mughal World: Studies on
Culture and Politics. New York, N.Y.: Columbia University Press, p. 15.
2 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 2007. Tārikh Mashāʾikh-i Chisht ( jild awwal). Karachi: Oxford
University Press, pp. 20–21.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_005

The Sufi Gaze: Perception of Women by Male Sufis 89

that “when a lion comes out of jungle, no one asks ‘is it male or female?’ (sher
ki az bīsha birūn āmad kisi na pursad ki īṅ sher nar ast yā māda ast).”3
Habib’s comments make one wonder about the reasons that disqualify or
restrict women from attaining the position of a Sufi Shaikh. Habib’s sweeping
statement that gender discrimination was not there is not qualified by any rea-
soning or supportive evidence. If barring persons from acquiring any socially
prescribed roles or positions or accessing any opportunities is not gender dis-
crimination, then what is gender discrimination? Sufi texts are replete with
stories and anecdotes that reflect male Sufis’ fear of being robbed of their spiri-
tuality by what they believed to be women’s innate wickedness. This deeply
ingrained fear of women’s imagined mischief-causing nature, on one hand,
encouraged asceticism and celibacy, and on the other hand, created strong and
resilient anti-women traditions, thus weakening family ties and encouraging
women’s disparagement. The epitome of Sufi perception of women, even as
virtuous as Bībī Sām, is summed up in Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn’s observation that
“woman was a man sent in the form of a woman” (āṅ zan mard ast ki o rā dar
ṣūrat-i zanān faristādand).4 Thus, in other words, spiritual virtues and assets
are male in their essence. One wonders at the real intent of the Shaikh—was
he admiring Bībī Sām or was he hinting at women’s proverbial deficiencies?
What we infer from these sources is that Sufi women, like men, have existed
all through the history of the Muslim. Unlike the male Sufis, as the nomen-
clature for Sufi women or public identification of Sufi women was different,
because of their nonassociation with leadership roles in the Sufi ṭarīqa, they
remained without position and titles of authority. Indeed, instead of being
extolled by august awe-inspiring temporal titles, such as Shaikh, Shaikhu’l
Shuyūkh, and Quṭb-i ʿᾹlam, Sufi women were identified by their spiritual mer-
its, such as ṣāliḥāt, qāniʿtāt, ʿabidāt, and more frequently as mastūra (the hid-
den one). Thus, for instance, when Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ recalled Bibi Fāṭima
Sām, he identified her as buzurg (the excellent one).5
The Qurʾān (33:35) has taught this way of identification of pious, devout,
humble, patient, fasting, and believing women who remember Him and for
whom Allāh promises forgiveness and a great award (maghfiratan wa-ajran
ʿazīman) along with men with the same virtues. The Qurʾān’s by its wisdom
(ḥikma) places all these pious and God-fearing persons in one single category,
the group of the friends of Allāh—Behold! verily on the friends of Allah there is

3 FF, Majlis 20, 27th of Jamādīʾul ākhir, 708/1308.

4 Ibid.
5 FF, Majlis 19, 11 of Zilḥajj, 720/12 January 1321.
90 Chapter 3

no fear, nor shall they grieve (10:62). Thus, the following section examines how
men looked at women.

3.1 Women as Chaos (Fitna)

Abu’l Ḥasan ʿAlī bin ʿUsmān al-Hujwīrī, one of the earliest known Sufis to settle
in South Asia, in the city of Lahore, in his treatise on taṣawwuf, the Kashfu’l
Maḥjūb (Uncovering the Veiled), depicted woman as the main cause of Adam’s
“fall” from Paradise—a view not found in the Qurʾān. Thus, the very first text on
taṣawwuf produced in the Persian language and the first one in South Asia, the
Kashfu’l Maḥjūb declares women as the cause of trouble. In a section entitled
“On the Etiquettes of Marriage and Celibacy” in Kashfu’l Maḥjūb, after recount-
ing the Qurʾānic dictums on marriage and the Prophet’s sayings on marriage as
his blessed sunnā, Hujwīrī expresses his personal views on women, which are
negative and reflect a deep-seated patriarchy in his psyche. Accusing women
of the cause of human misery, Hujwīrī lists three types of fitna (chaos) that
have occurred in human history and are the root cause of all later chaos. The
first one, Hujwīrī says, fell upon Adam in Paradise and was caused by a woman
( fitna ki bar sar-i Ādam alaihs-salām paidā āmad sabab-i āṅ zan būd andar
bihisht); the second one, the first quarrel that happened in this world ( fitna
ki andar dunyā padīd), i.e., the quarrel between Abel and Cain ( fitna Hābīl wā
Qābīl), was also caused by a woman. Third, Hujwīrī asserts that a woman is
the cause of the Divine punishment inflicted on the two angels (Hārūt and
Mārūt), which continues to the present day, and that all mischief and worldly
and religious chaos (hamā aṣbāb fitna dīnī wa dunyā) are caused by women.”6
Hujwīrī then quotes an Ḥadīth of the Prophet without giving any source:
“No other chaos causing harm to men is greater than the chaos of women.”
Concluding his tirade, he finally concludes his argument by questioning what
would be the inner self (bāṭin) of such a person (i.e., a woman) who causes so
much disorder in this world.7
Thus, Kashfu’l Maḥjūb, in its contents, vocabulary, and idiom, by reiterat-
ing paradoxical interpretations of the Qurʾānic verses, particularly regard-
ing human creation and understanding of the Prophet’s sayings on marriage
and celibacy, and position of women, sanctified the elements of Isra‌ʾilīyāt

6 Hujwīrī, pp. 426–27; Nicholson, p. 364.

7 Hujwīrī, p. 427.
The Sufi Gaze: Perception of Women by Male Sufis 91

discussed in Islamic jurisprudence.8 Hujwīrī, thus, despite his vast knowledge

of Sufis and Sufism, arrived loaded with misguided notions about women,
which he did not hide or kept to himself; he transferred them to the following
generations through his written words. In all fairness to Hujwīrī, he was not the
creator of these views; he acted as the most trustworthy and powerful conduit
of these views.
It is crucial to explain briefly the fallacy of Hujwīrī and others who continue
to subscribe to the erroneous understanding of the creation story as given
in the Qurʾān. Barbara Stowasser, in her critical study Women in the Qurʾan,
Traditions, and Interpretation, devotes chapter 2 on Eve to the argument that
the Qurʾānic story of Adam and Eve is different from the expulsion narra-
tives of the Bible which hold Eve accountable for the original sin and Adam’s
exit from heaven.9 Similarly, Amina Wadud and Asma Barlas argue that the
Qurʾān rejects the notion of woman as temptress of evil and does not blame
her for either the so-called original sin or the Fall of Adam.10 A stronger refu-
tation of the woman’s responsibility for expulsion from Heaven comes from
William C. Chittick. Drawing upon the Shafiʾite scholar from Marv, Aḥmad
Samʾani’s (d. 534/1140) commentary on the Qurʾān in which he does not refer to
Eve, Chittick argues that Adam’s fall is rooted in God’s mercy and forgiveness.
Chittick also observes that from Samʾani’s point of view, the question of Eve is a
secondary matter, not because women are unimportant but because the story
of Adam and Eve is not about gender roles; it is about God’s relationship with
all human beings.11
Hujwīrī, however, with his narrow vision, thus when professed that “Sufism
was founded on celibacy; the introduction of marriage brought about a change
[for the worse],”12 insinuated at what he believed was the disruptive role of
women. Comparing this disparagement of women and of the institution of
marriage with the Ḥadīth of the Prophet which guides the Muslim to believe
“there is no monkery (rahbāniyyā), no celibacy (tabattul), and no hermitage

8 Isra‌ʾilīyāt, a term derived from the word Isra‌ʾil and is applied by exegetes (mufassirīn) to
define Islamic traditions derived from the Hebrew Bible and later Jewish traditions.
9 Barbara F. Stowasser. 1994. Women in the Qurʾan, Traditions, and Interpretation. NY: OUP,
pp. 25–38.
10 Amina Wadud. 1999. Qur’an and Woman: Rereading the Sacred Text from a Woman’s
Perspective. New York: Oxford University Press; Asma Barlas. 2019. Believing Women in
Islam: Unreading Patriarchal Interpretations of the Qurʾan. [Place of publication not iden-
tified]: University of Texas Press.
11 William C. Chittick. 1999. ‘The Myth of Adam’s Fall in Aḥmad Samʾani’ s Rawḥ al-arwāḥ.’ In
The Heritage of Sufism Vol. 1. Edited by Leonard Lewisohn. Oxford: Oneworld, pp. 337–359.
12 Nicholson, p. 364.
92 Chapter 3

in Islam”13 and that “marriage is my sunna, and whoever dislikes my sunna

dislikes me,”14 one finds a blatant contradiction in Hujwīrī’s arguments,
elsewhere in his treatises, on the merits of following the noble Traditions of
the Prophet.15
In closing his treatise, Hujwīrī, in his last and final charge against women,
accuses them of reversing his attempt at revealing the hidden aspects of
taṣawwuf. This he explains is done by women who, from their rooftops or
from elsewhere, watch the Sufis busy in the audition of samāʿ, and thus dis-
tract them and create great obstacles in their spiritual exercises. Playing with
the word ḥijāb, he says that these women throw veils (ḥijābhā uftad) over the
meditative Sufis. Thus, he is probably insinuating that his task of unveiling the
veiled is ruined by women.16
Hujwīrī does not identify the location of the above-referenced samāʿ party.
He might have witnessed it in Lahore, a city which he could not appreciate.
His reference here is about trouble-causing women of Lahore. Thousands of
women who visit the shrine of Hujwīrī and address him reverently and affec-
tionately as Dātā Ganjbakhsh (the giver of treasures), might not be aware of
the burdensome legacy of Hujwīrī.
Similar views, but with greater force of conviction and aimed at a far wider
and continuous readership, came from Nizāmu’l Mulk Ṭūsī (1017–1092), the
erudite wazīr (minister) of the Seljuqs, known best for his Siyāsat-nāma or Siyār
al-mulūk (The Book of Government or Rules for Kings)17 and the Madrasa
Nizāmīyya, founded in 1065 in Baghdad and under whose syllabi generations of
Muslim males of South Asia learned their lessons. The Siyāsat-nāma, a favou-
rite reading in South Asia, declares that women, who were created for the pur-
pose of procreation, lack excellence in intelligence (kamāl-iʿaql nīst) and are
part of all depravity and chaos, mischief and wickedness ( juz fitna o fasād wa
shor o sharr). The book blames Eve for the problems that befell Adam, result-
ing in his fall from Heaven, and for causing mischief and chaos around ( fitna
wa fasād).18

13 J. Robinson. “Ḥadīth”, in Encyclopaedia of Islam. Second Edition. Leiden: E.J. Brill, vol. 3,
p. 23. First published online: 2012.
14 Abu Hamid Muhammad Ghazali. 1937. Ihya‌ʾ ʿUlūm al-dīn. Vol. 4. Cairo: Matbaʿat lajnat
nashr al-thaqafa ʿlislamiyya, p. 97.
15 For more discussion on marriage and celibacy in Muslim societies, see Valeri J. Hoffman-Lad.
1992. “Mysticism and Sexuality in Sufi Thought and Life.” Mystics Quarterly, 8 (3): 82–93.
16 Hujwīrī, p. 488; Nicholson, p. 420.
17 Hubert Drake. 1960. The Siyāsat-nāmāh or Siyār al-mulūk (The Book of Government or
Rules for Kings). Tr. from the Persian by Hubert Drake London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
18 Nizamu’l Mulk Tūsi. 1931. Siyāsat-nāma maʿ taʿlīqāt (for the examination of Kāmil in Farsi,
UP, India). Allahabad: Lālā Ram Narayan, chapter 42, pp. 157–164. Siyāsat-nāma continues
to be part of syllabi in Persian courses taught at various institutions in South Asia.
The Sufi Gaze: Perception of Women by Male Sufis 93

Hujwīrī was not the only one or the first one to view women and marital
relationships as the cause of trouble. Ibrāḥīm bin Adham (d. 776 or 790 H), the
Central Asian prince-turned-Sufi, best illustrates this thinking. He viewed that
family means destruction, because according to him, “when a man marries he
embarks on a ship, and when a child is born he suffers shipwreck.”19 South
Asian Sufi ways were also greatly influenced by al-Ghazāli (d. 1111), who in two
sections of his book Iḥyāʾʿulūm al-dīn (Revival of the religious sciences)—the
Kitāb ādāb al-nikāḥ (book on marriage) and Kitāb kasr al-Shwatayain (book on
controlling of the two desires)—presented a discourse on the merits of mar-
riage and celibacy, a topic which gradually emerged as a dichotomic debate
among the Sufis.20 Ghazāli identified “the desire for sex and voracious appetite
for women” as a moral vice.21
The negative representation of women in the Sufi canon, thus, turns women
into the “other,” supporting Hoffman-Ladd’s view that “the archetypal Sufi was
a man.”22 In simpler words, male Sufis viewed Sufism as a male domain which
must be protected in order to keep it safe from the entry of trouble-creators,
i.e., the women. The ruination caused by a woman was taken so seriously
that even a simple meal cooked by a woman of dubious background (ʿaurat-i
mushtabiha) and consumed by a Sufi could defile his purity by causing iḥtilām
(nocturnal emission of seminal fluid). In Aḥsanu’l aqwāl, Ḥammād Kāshānī
(d. 761/359–360), a disciple of Buhānu’d-Dīn Gahrīb, records an incredible
anecdote. During a discourse, while expounding on the six causes of iḥtilām,
Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb (d. 1338), khalīfa of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, the great
Chishtī Shaikh (d. 1325), related an episode in which one night all the inmates in
the hospice of Shaikh Bahāʾu’d-Dīn Zakarīyya were awakened by the nocturnal
emission (hamā yarān-i khānqāh muḥtalim bāshad). The Shaikh got perplexed.
When he asked who had cooked the last evening’s meal, he was told that the
slave girl (kanīz) brought from the market yesterday had prepared it. The saint
ordered that this woman, being a doubtful person, should not be permitted to

19 Abū Naṣr al-Sarrāj (Edited and translated by Reynold A. Nicholson). The Kitāb Al-Lumaʿ
Fi ’l-Taṣawwuf of Abū Naṣr ʿAbdallah B. ʿAlī Al-Sarráj Al-Ṭūsī. London: Luzac, 1963, p. 37; for
some interesting parallels between monastic Buddhism and ascetic Sufism, see T. Duka.
1904. “The Influence of Buddhism on Islam.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great
Britain and Ireland, pp. 125–141.
20 See the English translation of the two sections by Madeline Farah, Marriage and Sexuality
in Islam; A Translation of al-Ghazali’s Book on the Etiquette of Marriage from the Iḥyāʾ. Salt
Lake City: Utah: University of Utah Press, 1984.
21 T.J. Winter. On Disputing the soul and on Breaking the Two Desires, Books 22 and 23 of the
Religious Sciences. Cambridge: The Islamic Text Society, 1995, p. 106.
22 Valeri J. Hoffman-Lad. 1992. “Mysticism and Sexuality in Sufi Thought and Life”, p. 83.
94 Chapter 3

Figure 1 Women devotees at the Dātā Darbār, Lahore

cook meals from that date onwards.23 Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb also shared the
view of Farīdu’d-Dīn, who stated that, compared to men, good women are few
in this world (nek zanān dar jahān kam and wa nek mardān bisyār).24

3.2 Women as Deficient in Reasoning

In Sufi discourses and the inscribed Sufi texts, women are portrayed as imper-
fect beings (nāqiṣ), lacking in intellect (ʿaql) and in the comprehension of reli-
gion (dīn), and inadequate in physical prowess. Khairu’l Majālis, the malfūz of
Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī (the Lamp of Delhi) (1276–1356), compiled

23 Ḥammādu’d-Dīn Kāshānī, Aḥsanu’l aqwāl, pp. 124–25 [I have translated these excerpts
from a photocopy of the Persian manuscript of Aḥsanu’l aqwāl from the version uploaded
by Professor Carl Ernst (www.academia.edu/12537498/Ahsan_al-aqwal)]. I have also
consulted the published Urdu translation of the MS, Aḥsanu’l aqwāl al-maʿrūf ba afẓalu’l
maqāl by Muḥammad ʿAbu’l Majīd (Bombay: Maṭbaʿ-i Jahaṅgīrī, 1342/1923).
24 Ruknu᾽d-Dīn Kāshānī. Nafāʾisu’l-anfās. (Compiled ca. 1331–1337), p. 35 (I have translated
these excerpts from a photocopy of the Persian manuscript of Nafāʾisu’l-anfās from the
text uploaded copy by Professor Carl Ernst).
The Sufi Gaze: Perception of Women by Male Sufis 95

by Ḥāmid Qalandar, is replete with anecdotes illustrating women’s innate

lack of intellect.25 Ḥāmid Qalandar recorded the discourse of the Shaikh dur-
ing the period of one year, 755–756/1354–1355, when the Shaikh was around
eighty years of age. The Shaikh carefully watched how his spoken words were
recorded, and therefore he used to inspect the entries by Ḥāmid Qalandar and
commended the work by saying, darwish nekū niwishta (Darwish you have
written well). This makes his malfūz “the best example of the art of malfūzāt
writing.”26 It also shows that the contents of Khairu’l Majālis were approved by
Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī who was proficient in the knowledge of
fiqh.27 The Shaikh was so careful in maintaining the accuracy of his discourses
that on occasions when Ḥāmid Qalandar arrived late, he would restart his
discourse.28 In one of his discourses, explicating the causes of the revelation of
Sura al-aḥzāb (Qurʾān 33:28–29), he referred to the incident when Archangel
Jibrīl appeared with the Divine message before the Prophet at a time when he
was hard hit with lack of resources. The Message commanded the Prophet to
select “life of this world with its adornment or a life with the adornment of the
world of the Last Day.” Explaining this further, the Shaikh said that the revered
wives of the Prophet, on hearing that the Prophet had chosen poverty, began to
say, “now that the Prophet had preferred poverty we would not easily get good
clothes and meals.” They were worried because women are imperfect, and
therefore they lack in intellect and in religion (az āṅja ki zanān nāqiṣ bashand
han nāqiṣāt ‘aql wa dīn), he added.29 He further explained “that this incident
caused the revelation of the two ayahs of the Qurʾān (33:28–29).” The Shaikh
then discussed how the Prophet, instead of letting his wives know about this
revelation, adopted a cautious approach because he knew that women are
wanting in intellect. It is worth considering here that Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn was
not only expounding on a highly controversial exegesis of verses 33:28–29, but
that he also used a language that could be interpreted as not being respect-
able towards the Mothers of the Believers. The same verse, i.e, Sura Aḥzāb,

25 For his life account, see K.A. Nizami, 1991. The Life and Times of Shaikh Nasiru’d din
Chirāgh-i-Delhi. Delhi: I.A.D.
26 KM, Majlis Two; Saiyid Athar Abbas Rizvi, A History of Sufism in India. vol. 1. p. 7.
27 For details of his studies under renowned scholars of fiqh and Ḥadīth, see Raḥmān ʿAli,
Tazkirā-yi ʿulamāʾ yi Hind by Raḥmān ʿAli (Lucknow: Nawal Kishore, 1914), p. 238.
28 KM, Majlis 11.
29 KM, Majlis 51. The Shaikh cited the controversial Ḥadīth recorded in the Ṣaḥiḥ of al-Bukhārī
that ‘women are deficient in intellect and religion’. For more on this, see Marion Holmes
Katz. 2013. Prayer in Islamic Thought and Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, pp. 177–78.
96 Chapter 3

commands that the Prophet’s wives “are not like any [other] women” (33:32).30
Several months later, the Shaikh selected the same topic again for his dis-
course. Now he said that the Prophet, after receiving the verse (quoted above),
“kept it as a secret from his wives because of the fear that women are lacking in
intellect” (chuṅ du ayah manzil shud rasūl ʿalai-hi’s-ṣalāt wa’s-salām az zanān-i
khud mumtaniʿ dāsht az bīm āṅki nāqiṣ̣ ʿ̣ aql and).31 Unguarded words from the
mouth of a Sufi, indeed, sound strange and painful. In addition, it must be
noted that Shaikh Naṣīru’d Dīn’s widowed mother had intelligently and dex-
terously supervised his education since the age of nine and that one of his
sisters, Bībī Būbū Abadī, was a person of deep piety and lived with exemplary
courage.32
Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn was so greatly convinced of women’s deficiency in
intelligence that while narrating the excellence of Maulānā Fahkhru’d-Dīn
Rāzī’s (1149–1209)33 scholarship, he commented that once the Maulānā suf-
fered humiliation at the hands of a woman (ʿaurat-i bishikasta).34 Explaining
this shikast (humiliation/defeat), Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn further said that there
was a wise and saintly (buzurg) woman named Māmā.35 Maulānā Rāzī went
to see her, and during their conversation, Māmā asked the Maulānā, “O’
Fahkhru’d-Dīn do ye have the recognition of God (khudā rā mi shināsī)?” The
Maulānā wondered and thought, “Look! What a woman (zihe ʿaurat)! She is
quizzing me, the one who has authored several books on the cognition of God,
the Almighty.” Reading the Maulānā’s mind by her intuition, she said, “Did you
write the books of ʿilm-i kalām (speculative theology) on the cognition of the
essence and attributes of the Divine before or after [attaining] enlightenment
(mʿarifat)?” The Maulānā, who was riding a maḥfa,36 turned towards his atten-
dants, saying, “Get ready the bier ( janāzā) of Fakhr Rāzī as he has suffered
defeat at the hands of a woman (ki az dast-i zani bashikist).” Here, one can
see that for Rāzī, despite his reason-based knowledge, failure to respond to a

30 For more on women’s intellect and the biased male views, see Barbara F. Stowasser, ‘The
Qur’ān and History,’ in Amira El Azhary Sonbol. 2005. Beyond the Exotic: Women’s Histories
in Islamic Societies. (pp. 15–36). Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse University Press; Amina Wadud.
1999. Qur’an and woman: rereading the sacred text from a woman’s perspective. New York:
Oxford University Press.
31 KM, Majlis, 81.
32 See her biographical notice in Part 2.
33 Maulānā Fahkhru’d-Dīn Rāzī, born in Ray, Iran is one of the most distinguished theolo-
gians of Islam, known for his Tafsiru’l Kabīr.
34 KM, Majlis 91.
35 Khairu’l Majālis edited by K.A. Nizami gives the name of this woman as Baba, whereas the
Urdu translation (Translator’s name not given) gives the name as Mama. I use here Mama.
36 A kind of palanquin.
The Sufi Gaze: Perception of Women by Male Sufis 97

woman’s query was the end of his life; to Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn this was a humili-
ation for a man at the hands of a woman and not a discourse between two
knowledgeable persons. Thus, the Sufi and the philosopher both carried the
heavy baggage of misogyny and failed to understand that Allāh in His Mercy
has blown His essence into all human beings, irrespective of their physi-
cal forms.
In his 27th Assembly, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Din Chirāgh-i Dihlī responded to a
query of a disciple who asked what was that excellence of women that the
Prophet had referred to in his saying.37 He explained that women like Maryam
bint-i ʿImrān and Āsiyā, wife of the Pharaoh attained excellence because of
their patience in face of extreme difficulties.38 The Shaikh, identifying the
Ḥadīth from Mashāriqu’l Anwār, added that, compared to women, more men
have achieved excellence.
Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz (d. 1824), the eldest son of Shāh Waliu’ullah Dihlawī and
an acknowledged scholar of Ḥadith and tafsīr, was a Sufi with spiritual affili-
ation to three major Sufi silsilas, i.e., Naqshbandī, Qadirī, and Chishtī.39 He
had a wide circle of students and disciples. Unlike other Sufis of Delhi, such as
Ḥaẓrat Shāh Ghulām ʿAlī (d. 1824),40 Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz was liberal enough to
have good relations with some English officers, such as Colonel James Skinner
(d. 1841), William Fraser (murdered in 1835), and Archibald Seton (d. 1818).41 His
attitude towards women, however, remained conservative. Thus, once referring

37 This disciple quoted only part of the Ḥadīth. The complete authentic Ḥadīth is: Abū
Mūsā Al-Ashʿri reported: Allāh’s Apostle said, “Many amongst men attained perfection
but amongst women, none attained the perfection except Mary, the daughter on Imran
and Asiya, the wife of Pharaoh. And the superiority of ʿAʾisha to other women is like the
superiority of Tahrid (i.e. an Arabic dish) to other meals.” Source: Sahih Bukhari 057: 112.
Sahih Bukhari, Book 57 (Download Sahih Bukhari-Ḥadīth Collection Ḥadīthcollection.
com › downloadsahih-bukhari).
38 KM, Majlis 27.
39 Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz. Malfūzāt Shāh ʿAbdul Azīz (including Kamālāt-i ʿAzīzī) (Translated by
Maulawī ʿAzmat Ilāhī). Meerut: Maṭbaʿ Hāshmi, 1897. [First published in 1896]. I have
used the translation by Maulawī Muḥammad ʿAlī Luṭfī and Mufti Intizām Ullah Shāhābi.
Karachi: Pakistan Educational Publishers Ltd., 1960, p. 149. (Henceforth, referred to as
Malfūzāt Shāh ʿAbdul Azīz).
40 For Shāh Kālimu’llah’s refusal to let Mercalfe kiss his feet as he (Charles Metcalfe, British
Resident of Delhi) smelled of liquor (bū-i khamr), see Malfūzāt-i Sharīfa. Compiled by
Ḥaẓrat Maulānā Ghulām Muḥiyyu’d-Dīn Qaṣūrī and ed. by Muhammad Iqbāl Mujaddidi.
Lahore: Maktaba‌ʾ Nabawiyya, 1978, pp. 19, 128. [The Malfūzāt-i Sharīfa has no date.
Probably it was compiled sometime in 1818].
41 Malfūzāt Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz, pp. 214–15; also, see Muhammad Khalid Masud. 2000. ‘The
world of Shāh ʿAbd al-ʿAziz (1764–1824)’ (pp. 298–314), in Jamal Malik (Edited) Perspectives
of Mutual Encounters in South Asian History 1760–1860. Leiden: Brill, 2000.
98 Chapter 3

to a Ḥadīth but without citing the source, he said, “Do not instruct women to
learn to write. Instruct them to spin. More worthy among women is the one
who spins; among men, one who knows archery is the best.”42 Surprisingly,
this statement contradicts his admission that a large number of women visit
him, seeking information about ways of remembering Allāh (azkār) and about
fiqh.43

3.3 Women as Personifying the Evil World

In Sufi perception, the world which the Qurʾān says is one of the signs of His
creation (Qurʾān: 30:22) manifests evil. This evil, personified as a disobedient
woman in Sufi imagination, symbolises nafs al-ammāra, which the Qurʾān
defines as “the soul that is prone to evil” (Qurʾān: 12:53), often appears in the
Sufi texts to beguile the innocent God-fearing, God-remembering male into
worldly lust and gratification of his lower self. This “lower self,” curiously,
remains elusively resilient to all sorts of formulae of self-mortification applied
by the Sufis—from continuous fasting, partaking of a nonnourishing diet, and
doing harsh spiritual exercises, such as chilla-yi māʿkūs (the difficult ascetic
exercise of tying himself with a rope and hanging upside down, often in a
well, for forty days). The Sufis’ argument against women, thus, is built on their
theses that the scheming females are determined to derail the Sufi from his
serene path of ṭarīqat into the boiling cauldron, overflowing with satanic over-
tures. Thus, like a woman, who in the Sufi vision is a born seducer of men, the
world also entraps and entangles men and misleads them towards the path
of destruction and deprivation. ʿAbdur Raḥmān Jāmī (d. 1492), the author of
Nafaḥātʾul-uns, a biographical compendium of Sufis, viewed the world with
the utmost contempt and imagined it as “a dunghill and a gathering place of
dogs; and meaner than a dog is that person who does not stay away from it. For
the dog takes his own need from it and goes away, but he who loves it is no way
separated from it.”44
Contempt for women made the Sufis portray a dreadful image of women
as aged, old, hideous-looking beings. Ḥasan Sijzi in the 61st Assembly of
Fawa‌ʾidu’l-fuʾād, held on 13 Ṣafar 719/5 April 1319, in which the theme was tawba
and taqwā (repentance and abstinence), writes that during the discourse,
Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ turned his attention to the issues of this world

42 Malfūzāt Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz, p. 141.

43 Malfūzāt Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz, p. 62.
44 A. Schimmel. Mystical Dimensions of Islam, p. 109.
The Sufi Gaze: Perception of Women by Male Sufis 99

and of people being arrogant about it. In this context, he narrated a story for
which no historical base is cited as perhaps there is none. According to this
anecdote, once Ḥaẓrat ʿIsā saw an old, hideous woman—dark and ugly faced
(zāl, badḥāl, siyāh, karīh liqaʿ). When asked who she was, she told him, “I am
the World (man duniyā am).” To his query, “how many husbands did you have?”
she said, “Many, difficult to count. If only I could count, only then I would be
able to tell.” “Did any of these ever divorce thee?” asked Ḥaẓrat ʿIsā. “No. I killed
them all (hamā rā man kushtam),” she said. The Shaikh, after narrating the
story, commented that the life of a darwish, therefore, is all full of total bliss
(darwishī rāḥat tamām ast), thereby meaning living life in celibacy.45
It is worth mentioning here that Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ in his early days
of studentship in his hometown of Badayun, studied Mashāriqu’l Anwār of
the Badayun-born Ḥadīth scholar, Maulānā Raẓiu’d-Dīn Ḥasan Ṣaghānī (d.
1252) and memorised it. He was given a certificate to teach this book.46 Other
Chishtī Masters, such as Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī and Khwāja
Gīsū Darāz, acknowledged the authority of Mashāriqu’l Anwār in their
discourses.47 Although Mashāriqu’l Anwār is deemed an authentic collection
of the Prophet’s sayings, and perhaps because of this reason alone, continued
to be taught in major Islamic centres of learning in India till the late nine-
teenth century.48 However, it includes the sayings of the Prophet that could be
interpreted, if referred to and cited out of their original context, to be against
women. According to one such Ḥadīth reporting on the authority of Abū
Huraira, “The Prophet said, ‘Were it not for Bani Isrāʾīl, meat would not decay;
and were it not for Eve, no woman would ever betray her husband.’”49 Here we
are more concerned with Ṣaghānī’s comments on the last part of the reported
Ḥadīth, which is not supported by the Qurʾān. Explaining the content of this

45 FF, Majlis 61, 13th of Ṣafar, 719/April 5, 1319. This story, with the same negative description of
the old woman, is in the Sixth Assembly of Friday, Shawwāl, 584/1188 in Fawāʾīdu’s-sālikīn
(Morals for the disciples). Ḥaẓrat Bābā Farīdu’d-Dīn. Fawāʾīdu’s-sālikīn. Dihli: Maṭbaʿ
Mujtabāʾī, 1311/1893.
46 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 1991. The life and times of Shaikh Nizam-u’d-din Auliya. Delhi:
Idara-i Adabiyat-i Delli, pp. 189–90.
47 Sharaḥ Jawāmiu’l-kilam (malfūzāt), p. 241.
48 Annemarie Schimmel. 2004. The Empire of the Great Mughals: History, Art and Culture.
London: Reakton Books, p. 108; S.Z.H. Jafri. ‘Education and transmission of knowledge
in medieval India.’ In Recording the Progress of Indian History—Symposia Papers of the
Indian History Congress, 1992–2010. Edited by S.Z.H. Jafri. Delhi: Primus Books, 2012,
pp. 133–160.
49 Maulānā Raẓiu’d-Dīn Ḥasan Ṣaghānī. 1904. Ṭuḥfatu’l Akhbār tarjumā Urdū Mashāriqu᾽l
Anwār. Kanpur: Maṭbaʿ Majīdī, p. 196; Muhammad Muhsin Khan. 1997. Ṣaḥīḥ Bukhārī,
Arabic-English Translation, Vol. 4. Riyadh: Darussalam Publishers, Ḥadīth 3330, p. 329.
100 Chapter 3

reported Ḥadīth, he added that if there had been no Ḥawwā (Eve), no woman
would ever have treated her husband with treachery (khiyānat) and bad inten-
tions (badkhwāhī) because it was Ḥawwā who made Adam eat wheat. Finally,
condemning all women, Ṣaghānī declares that “with Ḥawwā, the instinct of
treachery in women began.”50 The Qurʾān, the only and the last source for a
non-gender-biased story of Adam and Eve and the events that took place in the
Garden of Eden, instructs Muslim believers in a totally different way, opposite
to this misleading explanation.51 Ṣaghānī refers to another Ḥadīth, reported on
the authority of Ḥaẓrat Jābir ibn ʿAbdullah, that “a woman comes in the form of
a devil and goes in the form of a devil. Whoever sees a woman should have sex
with his wife so that her [woman’s] danger goes away from the heart.” Not only
is this Ḥadīth quoted incompletely, the author also adds an explanation com-
menting that a woman is described in the form of Satan because she misleads
man as Satan does.52 Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, however, holds Ṣaghānī
and his scholarship in such high regard that he commented that whenever
the Maulānā experienced any difficulty regarding a Ḥadīth, he would seek the
Prophet’s help in his dream.53 Mashāriqu’l Anwār continued to hold its place of
importance. Thus, Shāh Walīullah (d. 1762) included it in a list of the top seven
readings for spiritual training.
The staunch celibate Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, though, had tender emo-
tions for his female relatives and women connected with his Sufi tradition.
He emerges in contemporary Sufi texts as a man who stood in fear of being
distracted by women from his path of devotion to Allāh. It is interesting to
note that Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ’s spiritual mentor, Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn, had
several wives; other male members of Shaikh Farīd’s family and several of
his prominent disciples were married persons. Thus, one wonders whether
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ’s fear of being entrapped by women had any connec-
tion with Ṣaghānī and his Mashāriqu᾽l Anwār. This strange fear is best illus-
trated by two anecdotes in Amīr Khwurd’s Siyaru’l Awliyāʾ. In the first story,
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, while in conversation with Khwāja Sālār, one of his
friends (yārāṅ), told him that towards the end of night he envisioned a woman
urging him not to recite a couplet divinely created in his heart (az ʿālam-i ghaib
dar dil-i man). Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ was sure that he saw this woman not in
a dream but while he was awake (bedārī). At this, Qāzi Sharfu’d-Dīn quipped,

50 Ṣaghānī, p. 196.
51 al-Qurʾān, 20: 115–21.
52 Ṣaghānī, p. 47. For comments on this Ḥadīth, see Saʿdiyya Shaikh. 2004. “Knowledge,
Women and Gender in the Ḥadīth: A Feminist Interpretation.” Islam and Christian–
Muslim Relations, 15 (1), 99–108.
53 FF, Majlis 9 of 29 Jamādiu’l Ᾱkhir, 712.
The Sufi Gaze: Perception of Women by Male Sufis 101

“This [woman] is the World (īṅ duniyā ast) which does not fancy leaving you.”
Affirming Qāzi Sharfu’d-Dīn’s wisdom in recognising the truth, the Shaikh
admired him.54
Amīr Khwurd narrates another anecdote related by Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ.
Once, towards the latter part of the night, he saw a woman sweeping the court-
yard of the Jamāʿat khāna. On inquiring who she was, she said, “I am the world
(man duniyā am), and I sweep the house of the Makhdūm.” At this, the Shaikh
said, “O, ye temptress ( fittāna) what business do you have to be in my house?
Get out of my house. Despite my insistence, she did not leave (har chand ki me
guftam, berūn nāmī raft). Thereafter, I placed my finger at the nape of her neck
and pushed her out of my house. I did not stop short at that and turned her
out of the lane. However, as long as my finger remained in touch with the nape
of her neck, she kept staring at me.”55 ʿAlī Asghar Chishtī, citing one source,
Gulshan-i Awliyāʾ, says that this incident occurred at the khānqāh of Shaikh
Farīdu’d-Dīn, who was not pleased when he came to know of it, and ques-
tioned what was the need to apply force (hāth chalāyā) to push this woman
in servitude (maqbūẓā) out, and why was she was not turned out by verbal
persuasion.56 The Farsi text of Jawāhir-i Farīdī, however, has more details of
this anecdote and says that when this incident occurred, Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn
was taking rest in his cell and Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ tried to persuade the
woman not to create noises as this was the retiring time (waqt-i khalwat) of
Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn. The woman, however, did not stop (bāz). At this, the
young Nizāmu’d-Dīn raised his voice and pushed her out. Hearing the com-
motion, Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn came out of his chamber and enquired about it.
When Nizāmu’d-Dīn said that he did not know who the woman was, Shaikh
Farīdu’d-Dīn said she was the world (īṅ dunyā ast) and that through thousands
of stratagems (ba hazār ḥīla) she presented herself to the Shaikh but he did
not accept her (lekin qabūl na-kardam).57 Thus, along the journey of ṭariqat,
though it is hard to get rid of women and the world, a Sufi has to make con-
certed efforts, as is reflected by the conduct of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ and his
mentor, Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn.
While some Sufis found women distracting them from the path of piety and
righteousness, others went through spiritual experiences of a different kind.
One such experience is recorded about Shaikh Aḥmad Khattu (d. 849/1446),

54 SA, pp. 127–28.

55 SA, p. 132.
56 ʿAlī Asghar Chishtī, Jawāhir-i Farīdī yaʿnī Tazkirā-yi Farīdī (Urdu translation by Fazlu’d-Dīn
Naqshbandī Mujaddidī). Pakpattan: Maktaba Bābā Farīd (n. d.), p. 274.
57 ʿAlī Asghar Chishtī. 1301/1884. Fihrist Kitab Jawāhir-i Farīdī. Lahore: Victoria Press, p. 205.
102 Chapter 3

the patron saint of Ahmedabad.58 Brought up and trained in spirituality by

Abū Isḥāq Maghribī (d. 776/1374–1375), Shaikh Aḥmad Khattu spent his ascetic
life in prayer and fasting. He not only remained unmarried but also while trav-
elling from place to place staying for nights in mosques with no friend or a
water-pot, remained safe from the evil of nocturnal emission.59 According to
this incredible anecdote, related by his murīd and compiler of his malfūzāt,
once, while in Madina, the Shaikh dreamt that the Prophet offered him a
woman, well-dressed, decorated, and crowned with jewels. After some initial
hesitation, he finally accepted the woman. Later, upon waking up, the Shaikh
thought that the woman was the world personified (āṅ aūrat dunyā ast) and
that the dream implied that now with the grace (ṣadaqa) of the Prophet the
doors of the world were open to him.60
Muḥammad Naʿīmu’llah Bahrāʾīchī (1153/1740–1741–1218/1803–1804), a dis-
ciple of the Mujaddidī-Naqshbandī Sufi, Mirzā Mazhar, argued that women
carry evil habits. Explaining why the Prophet did not touch the hands of
women while administering the oath of allegiance, he said that it was because
of the generically wicked characteristics of women.61 The Prophet, he argued,
avoided the touch of women’s hands as women, compared to men, have more
ignoble morals (akhlāq-i razīlā) and abominable nature (ʿādāt-i qabīḥa).
Naʿīmu’llah Bahrāʾīchī’s reasoning did not take into consideration Surah 4:23
which defines the boundaries of ḥurma (literally, the sanctity and protection of
all things created). Also, blaming women, Bahrāʾīchī inadvertently finds causa-
tion of the Prophet’s sunna (traditions) in “wicked women.” Bahrāʾīchī believed
that wives not only pilfer their husbands’ money, but they do it as a way of
tradition. Once these women, he argues, earn expertise in perfidy (khiyānat)
and fraudulence (bad-diyānati) by embezzling their husbands’ money, the
immorality and villainy of misappropriating others’ money is erased from their

58 For Shaikh Aḥmad Khattu’s life account, see his malfūzāt, Tuḥfatu’l-majālis compiled by
his disciple, Maḥmūd bin Saʿd bin Sadr Sufi Iraji, OIOC, DP, MS (An Urdu translation of
the work is also available). See Maḥmūd ibn Saʿīd Īrjī and Saiyyid Abū Ẓafar Nadwī 1990.
Tuḥfatu’l-majālis. Aḥmadābād: Ḥaẓrat Pīr Muḥammad Shāh Library and Research Centre;
AA, pp. 151–56. K.A. Nizami. “Shaikh Ahmad Maghribi as a great historical personality of
medieval Gujrat.” Medieval India—A Miscellany vol. III, Aligarh, (1975): 234–59; for his role
in the foundation of the city of Ahmadabad, see “Eight Arabic and Persian Inscriptions
from Ahmadabad,” by H. Blochmann in The Indian Enquiry, vol. IV (1875): pp. 289–93.
59 AA, p. 154.
60 AA, p. 153.
61 For an autobiographical note on the author under the heading Zikr aḥwāl-i muṣannif, see
Fozail Ahmad Qadri. 1981. Edition of Bisharat-i-Mazhariyah. Dissertation submitted for
the Degree of Master of Philosophy, Centre of Advanced Study, Department of History,
Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, pp. 644–658.
The Sufi Gaze: Perception of Women by Male Sufis 103

hearts. They become thieves. He also advocated that adultery occurs mostly
in compliance with women as they offer their bodies to men; men act under
women’s control (tābʿī). Because of women’s prime responsibility for adultery,
he argued, the Qurʾān prescribed punishment for adulterous women first and
adulterous men next. Erroneously assuming that poverty afflicts women alone,
he also argued that mothers kill their daughters because of the fear of hunger
and poverty.62
Thus, giving up worldly connections and adopting asceticism requires dis-
tancing from women. Being perceived as personifying the world must have
been arduous and burdensome for Sufi women as well as for other women.
Indeed, visualisation of women as an enticing world, and equating them with
evil, must have worked as a silencing agent for women aspirants to enroll
themselves as a murid (spiritual disciple). Women would not have dared to
approach the male Sufi. For those women who intend to cross these borders,
signposts stand, banning women’s entry beyond a certain specified sacred
space in the shrines.
62 Muḥammad Naʿīmu’llah Bahrāʾīchī. 2000. Muʿāmilāt-i Mazhariyya. (Translated by
Muḥammad Alṭāf Nairawi.) Lahore: Karmanwala Bookshop, pp. 59–65 [First published in
1275 H. in Kanpur].
 Chapter 4

The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family

This chapter reflects on the ongoing discourse on the male Sufis’ conduct with
their families and their interpersonal ties in connection with their family inter-
est. As said earlier, the primary Sufi texts—the malfūzāt, tazkirāt, and even
the Sufi maktūbāt—are voices of the Sufi male in an authoritarian position,
thus ordaining each utterance to be listened to without questioning it and to
follow it with total obedience. As all human relations entail the presence of
the other one, therefore it is natural to assume the other one, in this case, is a
family member. This other voice is not on record. Of course, absence on record
does not mean that the voice was not there; it does mean, however, that it was
not heard.
Before proceeding further and presenting evidential case studies, it would
be appropriate here to introduce the basics of a family structure that is often
cited as a model for Muslim believers. Family, the foundational block of the
community (ummat), rests on the trust of a social contract of marriage (nikāḥ)
between the two and which flourishes on a behaviour fashioned by iḥsān
(beauty and goodness), equity, and balance and justice between and among
all the members of the unit.1 The basic Sufi virtues of Allāh’s wariness (taqwā),
abstention (zuhd), patience (ṣabr), and reliance (tawakkul) emanate from
iḥsān. As marriage is not religiously incumbent, celibacy or single-life options
are permissible. What is not desirable is to shirk the responsibility while the
contract is in place. Unlike some male Sufis’ disparagement of married life and
aversion for family responsibilities, most of the pious women in this book did
not practice celibacy and fulfilled their responsibilities as wives and mothers
and thus followed the Tradition of the Prophet.2
Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī (1276–1356), disciple and the first Khalīfa
of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar’s successor, Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ, though he, like his Shaikh, remained celibate, in his discourses he
reflects the fear of family and children as a potential cause of spoiling prayers
and capable of entrapping a pious person in the bondage of worldly chains.

1 M.A. Muqtedar Khan. 2019. Islam and Good Governance: A Political Philosophy of Ihsan. NY:
New York Palgrave Macmillan.
2 Jamal Elias. 1988. “Female and Feminine in Islamic Mysticism.” The Muslim World, 78(34):
209–224.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_006

The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 105

A couplet of ʿAynu’l-Quẓāt Hamadānī (martyred in 1131)3 on the theme of

thousands of fetters that increase at each step led Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn to a
discourse on bonds that keep human beings chained to this world. He said
that there were two kinds of fetters: one, in accordance with the Islamic law
(band-i sharaʿī), and the other of the carnal desires (band-i nafsānī). The first
one consists of wife and children (zan-wa farzand) and the second consists
of wantonness and sensual pleasures (shahwāt wa lazzāt). The Shaikh urged
his followers that both of these should be broken because to a heart full of
Divine love, wives and children, mothers and sisters have no place.4 Children,
he argued, detract one from remembering Allāh, and the possession of wealth
turns one towards alluring bondmaids.5 To strengthen his argument, he quoted
Surah 64:15, which translated means that “your possessions and your offspring
are nothing but a trial for you.” Surprisingly, contrary to his sermons, Shaikh
Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd had a deep affection for his mother and sisters whom
he used to visit regularly in Awadh and later, following the death of his sisters,
brought their sons to Delhi and looked after them tenderly.6
The Sufi texts, thus, are replete with narratives reflecting the type of dichot-
omy that the above passage indicates. It is true that once a person enrolls as a
follower (sālik) of the path of ṭarīqa and becomes a murīd, by taking the oath
of allegiance (baiʿāt), spiritual lineage (shajara-nama) overcomes the physical
or biological lineage and ancestry (shajra‌ʾi ansāb). The new spiritual lineage,
traced directly back to the Prophet, mostly through Ḥaẓrat ʿAlī bin Abu Ṭālib,
is transmitted orally and in a written form to the novice.7 This new lineage cre-
ated a new bond which, to use the words of Karamustafa, created community

3 Hamadānī known for his mystical thoughts expressed through poetry on fanā (annihilation)
and baqā (abiding in God) was executed at age thirty-three on charges of heresy. His works,
particularly, the Tamhidat, were read by the Chishtī Sufis. Gīsū Darāz (d. 1422), the successor
of Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd, though critical of ʿAynu’l Quẓāt’s views, wrote a commentary titled
as Sharh-i Tamhidat. See Firoozeh Papan-Matin 2010. Beyond Death the Mystical Teachings
of ‘Ayn al-Quḍāt al-Hamadhānī. Leiden: Brill; Hamid Dabashi. 1999. Truth and Narrative: The
Untimely Thoughts of ‘Ayn al-Quḍāt al-Hamadhānī. Richmond, Surrey: Curzon.
4 KM, Majlis, 29.
5 KM, Majlis, 36.
6 See for more details, Zamīma (Supplement) in Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. Khair-u’l-majālis:
Conversations of Shaikh Nasir-u’d-din Chirāgh of Delhi [ob. 1356] compiled by Hamid Qalandar.
Aligarh: Muslim University, pp. 282–90. Also, see a notice on his sister, Būbū Abādī/ Bībī Bū
Abadī/ Baŕī Buā, in Part 2 of this book.
7 For a written form of a shajara-nama, see Sufi ʿAbdu’l Ḥakīm Shāh. 1404/1983. Shajara-sharīf
khwajgān- i Chishtīyya, Ṣābirīyya, Quddūsiyya, Hāshimiyya maʿ waẓāʾif. Shaikhupura.
106 Chapter 4

“across time and space [and] all those who shared the same pedigree made up
familial community.”8
Historically speaking, the spiritual ancestry recorded in the scrolls of
shajara-nama created a community with stronger bonds of newer relation-
ships, almost replacing the old identities based on blood ties with new ones,
often “pan-Islamic lineages,” Buehler says.9 One example that best illustrates
these new ties comes from Nafā’isu᾽l-anfās of Ruknu’d-Dīn Dabīr Kāshānī
(d. after 1337). According to this malfūz of Khwāja Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb (d.
738/1337), a Khalifa of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, when the mother and the broth-
ers of Kāshānī took their oath of allegiance at the hands of the Khwāja, the
Khwāja commented, “Today something good has happened; your mother has
become the daughter of Shaikhu’l Islam Nizāmu’d-Dīn.”10 Thus, the celibate
and childless Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ gets a daughter and that too after
his demise.
The letters of Khwāja Gīsū Darāz (d. 825/1422) reflect these new relation-
ships of the spiritual community best when he addresses his disciples and
khalīfas as farzand-i dīnī (son in faith) or as biradar-i dīnī (brother in faith).11
Despite these newer bonds, the old family ties remained intact and strong,
demanding and expecting a responsible pattern of behaviour. In the sections
that follow, these behaviours are examined in light of available textual sources.

4.1 Women as Mothers, Sisters, and Daughters

Ḥaẓrat Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb (d. 1338), khalīfa of Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ,

had an exemplary reverential relationship with his mother and family and
presents a classic example of maintaining a balanced relationship between his
filial obligations and his Sufi way of life. To him, both were interconnected.
Honouring the role of a mother, he once commented upon the central role
mothers have in the spiritual development of their sons.12 Thus, women in

8 Karamustafa, Ahmet T. 2007. Sufism. The Formative Period. Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univer-
sity Press, p. 116.
9 Arthur Buehler. 1998. Sufi Heirs of the Prophet: The Indian Naqshbandiyya and the Rise of
the Meditating Sufi Shaykh. University of South Carolina Press, p. 20.
10 Majlis on Muḥarram 8, 733/September 29, 1332, Ruknu’d-Dīn ʿImād Kāshānī. Nafā᾽isu᾽l
anfās (MS.) Khuldabad (compiled in 1331–1337), pp. 34–35.
11 Khwāja Ṣadru’d-Dīn Abu’l Fath Saiyyid Muḥammad Gīsū Darāz Chishtī and Saiyyid ʿAta‌ʾ
Ḥusain (Edited). 1362/1943. Maktūbāt Imāmu’l ʿĀrifīn Saiyyid Muḥammad Gīsū Darāz.
Hyderabad: Barqī Press.
12 Ruknu᾽d-DīnbnImād Kāshānī. Nafā’isu᾽l-anfās, p. 35. Also, Carl W. Ernst. 1992. Eternal
Garden: Mysticism, History, and Politics at a South Asian Sufi Center. Albany: State Univer-
sity of New York Press, p. 144.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 107

their relational roles, such as those of a mother, wife, sister, and daughter, were
highly adulated by the Sufis, who constantly guided their disciples and other
people, through their model behaviour and sermons respecting the women of
their families. Although eulogised for their abstinence and patience, most of
these women remained anonymous. These stories, in which the females’ iden-
tity often remains hidden and is classified under familial connections, work as
props to highlight the superiority of male spirituality as compared to female
spirituality because the virtues of the females in these narratives are depicted
as virtues inherited from their male relatives. These virtuous women, thus, are
depicted as ancillary to the male Sufi who is the original product or the arche-
type. In almost all these narratives, it is the woman and not the man whose
family connection is identified first. Thus, the opening sentence of Bībī Ᾱrām
Ḥaṣūr’s notice in Azkār-i Abrār, the Urdu translation of Gulzār-i Abrār (the
Garden of the Pious), identifies her as the sister of Saiyyid Ḥasan Naharwālā
and not by saying that Saiyyid Ḥusain Naharwālā was her brother.13
In the case of another brother-sister narrative of Bībī Raushan Ārāʾ (d. 1342)
and Saiyyid ʿAbbās ʿAlī of Basirhāt, West Bengal, the exploits of the brother
caught the scribes’ attention while most information about the sister is scarcely
found. Similarly, the mid-thirteenth-century pious woman, Bībī Khadīja, is
merely described as the respected wife (ḥaram muḥtaram) of Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn
Suwalī by the most erudite author Mir Khwurd (d. 1311–1312) in Siyaru’l Awliyāʾ,
the most authentic tazkira of the early Sufis of the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries in South Asia.14 Similarly, an episode of an elderly pious mother show-
ing no grieving emotions on hearing the news of the death of her eighty-year-
old son is recorded by Badaoni (d. 1540) in his third volume of Muntakhabuʾt
tawārīkh which contains biographies of religious persons and scholars, mostly
of the sixteenth century. As is typical of the texts of that period, Badaoni does
not include a single woman in the volume, and in this account reveals the name
of the male Sufi but does not bother to name his pious mother. In this narra-
tive, Mīr-i Kalān, the first teacher of Emperor Jahangir and a person of “angelic
nature” “endowed with both inward and outward perfection,” was on his death
bed, and his mother was reading the Qurʾān. When the news of her son’s death
was conveyed to her and permission for burial was sought, instead of grieving,
she recited the verse: We are God’s, and to Him do we return. We have no further
knowledge about this woman and her strong faith in God. Badaoni, though
he knew Mīr-i Kalān, left this pious woman unnamed. The episode, however,
contradicts the claims of scholars who have falsely propagated women’s lack of

13 Azkār-i Abrār, p. 118.

14 See her biographical notice in Part 2 of this book.
108 Chapter 4

understanding of religion and shows that even an old woman understood her
faith well and had complete trust in God.15
In this regard, an interesting explanation is offered by Wahid Mirza. Writing
about the life of Amīr Khusraw, he noticed no references about his sisters.
Wahid Mirza observed, “The Eastern biographers generally do not bother
themselves about the female relatives of a person: they are considered to be
either too insignificant to be mentioned or too sacred and inappropriate to
be brought into the glaring and unholy light of publicity.”16 This anonymity
of women is a social and cultural marker and should not be overlooked or dis-
missed as merely circumstantial or as faults of individual scribes. Often, the
scribes wanted to protect the sanctity of those who chose to live away from
public gaze and in seclusion. Perhaps it is because of this reason that women
are identified by their familial ties and not by their given names.
Despite these omissions in Sufi discourses, some valuable references are
found in the family narratives of male Sufis in which mothers, wives, sisters,
and daughters are included mainly to illustrate the Shaikh’s maleness and
magnanimity in the context of familial piety. Mothers are often deployed in
these narratives to establish the transmission of virtues to the male Sufis while
still in the womb of their mothers. Thus, for example, Bībī Rāstī (d. 695/1295),
mother of Shaikh Ruknu’d-Dīn Abu’l Faṭh, Rukn-i-ʿĀlam (d. 1335), and the
daughter-in-law of Shaikhu’l Islam Bahāʾud-Dīn Zakarīyya (d. 1267) is saluted
by Bahāʾud-Dīn Zakarīyya When the Bībī asked the reason for this respect for
her which was more than what he used to do on other occasions, the Shaikh
explained the reasons for it. He told her. “O the respected lady! This honour
is for the person who right now is in your womb and is the light and lamp of
my family.”17
Also, through mothers, spiritual inheritance is established. Thus, the mother
of Khwāja Bāqī Billah (d. 1012/1603), who introduced the Naqshbandī Sufi
silsila in Hindustan, remains anonymous, but her lineage to Khwāja Ubaidullah
Aḥrār (d. 855/1490) of the Naqshbandī Sufi silsila is recorded to establish and
solidify the Naqhbandī ancestry of her son.18
The Sufi Shaikhs viewed daughters as emblems of Divine Blessings and guar-
antors for the safe passage of their parents from this world to Heaven. Some
daughters proved to be the carriers of the spiritual virtues of their esteemed

15 ʿAbdu’l Qādir Badaoni. 1284/1867. Muntakhabuʾt tawārīkh. Lucknow: Maṭbaʿ Khās Munshi
Nawal Kishore, p. 330.
16 Mohammad Wahid Mirza. The Life and Works of Amir Khusrau (Calcutta, 1935), p. 17.
17 Jamālī, pp. 140–141.
18 See her biographical notice in Part 2 of this book.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 109

fathers. Despite this, daughters suffered most, as compared to other female rel-
atives, the weight of misogynist traditions. A slight breach by a daughter of the
moral code of behaviour, set under the male norms of honour, could jeopardise
a father’s status. Naṣiḥat farzand-i bihishtī samaratu’l fu’ād ʿafīfā (Counsel for
the virtuous daughter, the fruit of heart, bestowed by Heaven), is a passionate
poetical composition of Amīr Khusraw, the most favourite disciple and friend
of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, which the poet mandates as a manifesto illus-
trating this father-daughter relationship.19 However, the advice of Khusraw to
his daughter, in this poem in which he mandates a highly subordinated and
male-controlled life for her, sadly reflects that either he cared less for his spiri-
tual mentor’s views, or that the Shaikh, for some reason, did not reject or rep-
rimand his favourite disciple and friend. It is to be noted that Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ loved his mother and sister tenderly and always and guided his follow-
ers to treat their daughters and mothers with love, affection respect.
Though Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl, the daughter of Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī
Ajmerī (d. 633/1236), according to some sources, was granted khirqa-i khilāfat
by her father, most others were denied this position merely because of their
gender.20 The earliest example of this unjust decision was set by Shaikh
Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar (1175–1265), who denied Bībī Sharīfa, his second
daughter, to succeed him by declaring that a woman is not authorised to suc-
ceed a Sufi master.21
In all Sufi texts, mothers and motherhood are glorified and highly valorised.
This pattern of behaviour is modelled on the Traditions of the Prophet. In one
of these Traditions, the Prophet was thrice asked whom he should respect,
and thrice he replied, “Respect your mother.”22 The intense discourse on the
oft-repeated theme of female inferiority and lack of intellect takes a positive
turn when one reads stories glorifying motherhood and filial bonds with moth-
ers. Among these mother stories, some mothers, in addition to being moth-
ers of Sufis, were Sufis themselves. Other classic examples of such cases are
of Bībī Zulaikha (d. 648/1250), mother of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, and of
Bībī Fāṭima, the mother of Ḥazrat Miyāṅ Mīr (d. 1635), and Bībī Jamāl Khātūn
(d. 1647).23

19 Amīr Khusraw. 1290/1873. Hasht Bihisht. Lucknow: Maṭbaʿ Nawal Kishore, pp. 21–25.
20 See her biographical notice in Part 2 of this book.
21 See her biographical notice in Part 2 of this book.
22 Ṣaḥīḥ al-Bukhārī, vol. 8, 2, cited by Avner Giladi in Muslim Midwives: The Craft of Birthing
in the Premodern Middle East. (Cambridge University Press, 2014), p. 44; also see Arin
Shawkat Salamah-Qudsi. 2011. “A Lightning Trigger or a Stumbling Block: Mother Images
and Roles in Classical Sufism”. Oriens. 39 (2): 199–226.
23 See biographical notices of all these pious women in Part 2 of this book.
110 Chapter 4

Among the narratives of mothers and motherhood, the charismatic tale of

Bībī Zulaikha, mother of the Chishtī Sufi Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, is of
utmost significance. Among all the other narratives of caring and affectionate
mothers of the Sufis, Bībī Zulaikha was divinely bestowed in a dream with the
unique privilege of selecting between her dying husband and her unborn son.
She selected the son because the dream foretold her that the son was one of the
chosen ones of Allāh. In shaping her fatherless child into a Shaikhu’l-mashāiʾkh
(a master of the masters), Bībī Zulaikha’s efforts under extremely trying cir-
cumstances, are worth mentioning. Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn’s regard for his
mother was so great that long after her demise, tears would come to his eyes
on remembering her.
According to a testimony recorded by Dārā Shikūh in Ṣafīnatu’l Awliyāʾ
on the authority of Miyāṅ Mīr, both Miyāṅ Mīr and his Sufi sister, Bībī Jamāl
Khātūn, were born Sufis as a result of the prayer (manajāt) of their mother, Bībī
Fāṭima, to have a son as a perfect saint (ʿārif-i kāmil). The prayer was heard and
answered not with one Sufi child but two, a daughter and a son. Both of them
learned the secrets of the other world (kashf ʿālam-i malkūt) from her.24
There are tales of mothers who, despite their venerated position as moth-
ers, bowed in front of their sons, took the oath of allegiance at their hands, and
became their disciples. Thus, Bībī Jīū, the mother of Saiyyid Khwānd Mīr ʿArīzī,
a Chishtī Sufi (d. 874/1469) who lies buried in Pattan, Naharwala, became a
disciple of her son by taking an oath of allegiance.25 Bībī Naʿīma, also known
as Baŕī Ṣāḥiba, the mother of Ḥabīb Allāh Ṣibghat Allāhī (d. 1041/1632) and who
herself possessed miraculous powers, became a disciple of her son by perform-
ing baiʿat at his hands.26 Phūl Bībī (d. 1172/1758), in Allahabad, not only was a
friend of Allāh with miraculous powers but had the unique honour being the
wife of a devout Sufi, Ḥaẓrat Shāh Muḥammad Māh Qalandar (1140/1728), and
the mother of three sons, each of whom reached the highest stations of mys-
tic path and left a trail of excellent (kāmil) Sufis which continues until today.
Later in her life, Phūl Bībī became a disciple of her eldest son, Shāh Bāsiṭ ʿAlī
Qalandar of the Qādirī silsila and who was the khalīfa of Shāh Illahdiyā Aḥmad
Qalandar of Laharpur (d. 1147/1735).27
The primary Sufi texts have several narratives showing how mothers took
the utmost care to provide the best possible education and training for their
sons who later on, because of this excellent guidance, attained great heights

24 Muḥammad Dārā Shikūh. Safīnatu’l-awliyāʾ (Agra: Maṭbaʿ-i Madrasa Āgrā, 1853),

pp. 116–17.
25 ʿAlī Muḥammad Khan. 1306/1889. Mirāt-i Aḥmadī- jild sānī. Bombay: Maṭbaʿ Fathu’l
Karīm, p. 42.
26 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, p. 224.
27 Shah Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar ʿAlawī Kākorwī. 1293/1876. Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ (no name of the
publisher), p. 296.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 111

of scholarship and spirituality. In Sufi hagiographies, some mother narratives

report that with their piety and devotion to God, they began training the future
Sufi while still in their wombs. One such hagiographical anecdote narrates that
Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Quṭbu’d-Dīn Bakhtiyār Kākī’s (d. 1235) widowed mother tried
her best to provide education for her son.28 Indeed, she began it while he was
still in her womb. She is reported to narrate that when she used to get up for
her tahajjud prayers, she could hear him doing zikr. Another miracle story says
that the Khwāja, too, along with his mother who was memorising the Qur’ān,
memorised the first fifteen chapters of the Qurʾān while still in the womb.29
Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Din Chirāgh-i Dihlī narrates how the mother of Maulānā
Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Ḍarīr of Bukhara, despite his obvious physical handicap of
being blind, took him to the best of the scholars of her time and successfully
persuaded them to teach her son to become a leading scholar.30 Khwāja Gīsū
Darāz (d. 825/1422) was guided and advised by his mother Bībī Rānī, wid-
owed in 732/1332, when the Khwāja was eleven years old. Her husband died
while the whole family was in Daulatabad, Deccan. Several years later, after
some resentment with her brother, Bībī Rānī suddenly moved back to Delhi
along with her children. This single woman cared tenderly for her children,
even facilitating the spiritual pursuits of her younger son, Khwāja Gīsū Darāz.
A hagiographical anecdote records how careful she was in her supervision of
her son. Once she reprimanded the twelve-year-old Khwāja whose wrathful
gaze dismembered a crow that dared to defecate in his ablution (waẓū) ewer.
In response to her son’s excuse that the crow was punished for his act of dis-
respect, the watchful mother said, “Oh Saiyyid Muḥammad, is this what you
should do if someone is disrespectful towards you?” The Khwāja learned the
lesson for the rest of his life and with his cheerful look the crow flew away.
Another such incredible story is about the time when the Khwāja was a grown-
up Sufi Master and had his disciples. Once one of his disciples broke his tawba
(repentance) and indulged in drinking and died. The Mother knew the secret
of this death and once again she reprimanded the son, saying that “if a disciple
breaks his promise, will he be killed?” The Khwāja repented and for the next
six months abstained from extending baiʿat and resumed it only when once
when he was lost in meditation, the Prophet came to him in a vision and com-
manded him to resume baiʿat.31

28 KM, Majlis 32.

29 Illah Diyā Joyā. 1906. Risālā Siyaru’l Aqṭāb (translated in Urdu by Muḥammad ʿAlī Joyā.
Kanpur: Nawal Kishore), p. 129.
30 KM, Majlis 6.
31 Maulawī Muḥammad Sulṭān. 1343/1924. Armughān-i Sulṭānī al-maʿrūf sair-i Gulbarga.
Hyderabad: ʿĀzam Steam Press, pp. 66–67.
112 Chapter 4

Thus, although veneration and adoration of mothers is an appreciative

and meritorious act, morally as well as socially, it does create an anomaly in
male codes of behaviour. Disparagement of women who are not their mothers,
by anyone but more particularly by Sufis, is not a commendable behaviour.
Indeed, it becomes problematic when women are disparaged and scorned, if
not hated. The following section adds further to this behavioural dichotomy.

4.2 Women as Wives

Vilification of wives as the worst agents of polluting sainthood by keeping hus-

bands involved in family affairs is a frequent theme in the Sufi texts. In these
tales, disobedient wives and spendthrift wives are fated to be punished in this
world and in the world hereafter. Hujwīrī’s account of his short-lived disastrous
marriage and later his grievances against wives worked as a powerful manifesto
against marital life and wives’ mischiefs. In a section titled “concerning rules
in marriage and celibacy” ( fil tazwīj wa tafrīd) of the Kashfu’l maḥjūb, Hujwīrī,
to set a warning example for other men, adds a note about his own experience
of married life. For eleven years, he writes, God kept him guarded from the
dangers of married life, but fate (taqdīr) cast him into the discords of matri-
mony. Consequently, his whole being—the inside and the outside of his life
(zāhir wa bāṭin), became captive (asīr) of this woman he married. This state
lasted for one whole year. However, before his faith could be ruined, Allāh with
all His Excellent Benevolence and Perfect Grace, saved him.32 After citing his
own case, he presents his final argument, emphasising that celibacy, and not
marriage, is the Sufi way. Thus, the rules of the Sufi path are based on celibacy
because as soon as marriage takes place, things go into disorder.33 In support
of his views against women, Hujwīrī argues further that in his time it was not
possible to have a suitable wife whose demands were not excessive and absurd.
To protect themselves against demanding wives, most persons have adopted
celibacy and keeping their life light (takhfīf), argued Hujwīrī.34
The unruly, spendthrift wives needed to be disciplined. Thus, manuals, guide-
books, and books on good wives gradually came into vogue. The best illustration
in this context comes from Anīsu’l arwāḥ (the Companion of the Souls), con-
sidered an apocryphal malfūz of Shaikh ʿUsmān Hārwanī (d. 1211), and whose
authorship is attributed, according to some erroneously, to Khwāja Muʿīnu’d-
Dīn Chishtī, his murīd and khalīfa. In the tenth assembly of Anīsu’l arwāḥ, the

32 Hujwīrī, p. 427.
33 Ibid.
34 Ibid, p. 426.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 113

merits of treating daughters with love and affection, who are a gift (hadyā)
of God, were discussed. Elucidating the merits of having daughters, the dis-
course emphasised that on the Last Day, the parents of a girl would be at a
distance of five hundred years away from Hell.35 For married women, however,
the book prescribes a harsher code of duties and presents a sordid image of
conjugal life. In Majlis Four, for which women’s obedience and freeing a cap-
tive was the theme, Shaikh ʿUsmān Hārwanī, narrating a Ḥadīth of the Prophet
on the authority of Ḥaẓrat ʿAlī, says that a woman who obeys her husband
enters Heaven. A woman who does not obey her husband’s command to sleep
with him (for sex), loses all the rewards for her acts of virtues acquired earlier,
and is left with no signs of virtues. She ends up having as many evils as a des-
ert has sand particles. If she dies (while being disobedient in this particular
matter), the seven doors of hell (haftād dar-i dozakh) are opened for her; if
she dies while her husband is pleased with her, seventy stations of Heaven
(haftād darajā az bihisht) wait for her. Further, citing Taṅbih, he said that it
is written that if a woman displays resentment (tursh) towards her husband,
sins as many as stars in the sky are recorded in her logbook of deeds.36 The
discourse did not stop at this, as if it was not sufficient either for the ego of the
husband or for the humiliation of a wife. Anīsu’l arwāḥ added further that if
blood from one nostril and suppuration and pus were to pour from the other
nostril of her husband’s nose, and the wife licks it clean with her tongue, even
then the husband’s rights over her would never be fulfilled. Concluding this
manual of duties of a subservient wife, it says, “Therefore, O’ Derwish! If pros-
tration to anyone, except God, was permissible, says the Prophet, it would have
been by the wives to their husbands.”37 Taṅbihu’l Ghāfilīn (Admonition to the
Neglectful), to which Shaikh ʿUsmān Hārwanī is said to have referred in sup-
port of his argument, remains a popular work on jurisprudence in South Asia
and is widely read there. Several Urdu translations of the book, at an afford-
able price, are available. In a section under the heading “Rights of husband
over the wife,” its author, Abu’l Lais al-Samarqandī (d. 373/983) includes three
most popular sayings attributed to the Prophet, which are used in support of
subordination and physical chastisement of women. The first one is that the
Prophet said that if prostration were permissible to a human being, he would
have commanded the wives to do it to their husbands. Second, the first thing
for which a woman would be questioned, after the mandatory prayers, on the

35 Majlis 10, Khāwja Muʿīnu’d-Dīn Chishtī. Anīsu’l arwāḥ. Lucknow: Maṭbaʿ Ḥusainī, 1289/
1872, pp. 22–23.
36 Ibid, Majlis 4, pp. 22–23; Taṅbih is a reference to Taṅbihu᾽l Ghāfilīn authored by the famous
jurist, Naṣr bin Muḥammad bin Ibrāhīm Abu’l Laith al-Samarqandī, popularly known as
Imāmu’l Hudā (d. 373/983).
37 Anīsu’l arwāḥ, Majlis 4, p. 11.
114 Chapter 4

Last Day, would be about the fulfilment of her obligations towards her hus-
band. Third, he mentions the Prophet’s approval of beating a wife in such a
way as no marks (of beating) remain visible.38
Although Anīsu’l arwāḥ is considered spurious and fake by several schol-
ars, it was fairly well known during the time of Khwāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i
Dihlī. Not only had he seen it, but he had read it also. Chirāgh-i Dihlī denied
the authenticity of the book for two reasons. First, the text was not in confor-
mity with the stature of Shaikh ʿUsmān Hārwanī’s nature and scholarship, as
there were several such words in it that could not be considered proper to his
status. Second, Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, his pīr (Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn’s),
had categorically declared that none of the Sufis of his silsila (the Chishtīyya)
authored any text.39 Despite the doubts about the authenticity of Anīsu’l
arwāḥ, its contents about wives remain lodged in public memory, particularly
in the male psyche.
Thus, knowing well that the text of Anīsu’l arwāḥ is wrongfully associated
with Muʿīnu’d-Dīn Chishtī, and that it is a spurious work, what then makes
me concerned with the contents of this forged text? My concern is that this
book had had an audience at the time when it was first written, so much so
that not only had Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī (d. 1356) read it, but also
the person who introduced the topic of this malfūz had read it so thoroughly
that he was in a position to quote certain sections from it. It must be noted
that at the time this discourse took place, books were all in manuscript form
and were not easily available. Those who wanted to have their own copies had
to pay a high price for it. Interestingly, despite the fact that the Anisu’l arwāh
was rejected as a fake book, Shaikh Sharfu’d-Dīn Yāhyā Manerī (d. 485/1381)
of the Firdawsī silsila, as mentioned by Rizvi, not only did not question the
Malfūzāt of Shaikh ʿUsmān Hārwanī but “sought to gloss over the statements
which seemed incredible to him.”40
The theme of a disobedient wife in matters of sex and of disciplining her by
beating her remains a recurrent topic of Sufi discourses and religious debates.
Shaikh ʿAlī Muṭṭaqī (885/1480–975/1567) in his al-ʿunwān fi sulūk an niswān (on
the theme of the conduct of women) refers to disobedient wives who step out

38 Naṣr bin Muḥammad bin Ibrāhīm Abu’l Lais al-Samarqandī. 1288/1872. Taṅbihu᾽l Ghāfilīn.
(Urdu translation by Muḥammad ʿAbdu’l Sattār Khan). Lucknow: Maṭbaʿ Asadī, pp. 180–
187 under section sixteen, entitled jorū aur khāwind kai ḥaqq kā bayān (an account of
wife-husband rights). Another Urdu translation is by Muhammad Sharif Naqshbandi,
Lahore: Shama Book Agency (1999), pp. 679–681.
39 KM, Majlis 11.
40 S.A. Rizvi.1991. Muslim Revivalist Movements in Northern India in the Sixteenth and
Seventeenth Centuries. Lucknow: Balkrishna Book Company, p. 27.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 115

of their husband’s houses without his permission and are punished for it. He
also mentioned wives’ disobedience to husbands in sexual relationship.41 The
theme resurfaced in a late-nineteenth-century Urdu translation of this work
which, in addition to Shaikh ʿAlī Muṭṭaqī’s reprimands for ungrateful wives,
added more about disobedient wives. The book advises the husband, when
physically chastising her, to be careful not to break her bones or puncture her
skin to avoid bleeding.42
The treatment meted out by Shaikh Quṭbu’d-Dīn Kākī (d. 1235) of the Chishtī
silsila, to his new bride is another example of women viewed as obstacles in
the path of male spirituality. Quṭbu’d-Dīn Kākī (about whom an incredible
narrative in a hagiography says that he learned by heart fifteen chapters of the
Qurʾān and used to recite the names of Allāh at tahajjud, the midnight prayer,
while still in the womb of his mother)43 divorced his wife three days after their
marriage. Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ narrated that once a man named Ra‌ʾīs44 nar-
rated to Quṭbu’d-Dīn Kākī that he dreamt that the Prophet was not happy
with the Shaikh as he was not sending his usual nightly gift to the Prophet
for the past three nights (alluding to the three nights of his conjugal life). To
Quṭbu’d-Dīn Kākī it meant that, as he was busy for the last three nights with
his bride, he therefore could not offer his usual nightly three thousand saluta-
tions (darūd) to the Prophet. To Quṭbu’d-Dīn Kākī, the wife was the cause of
this mischief. He called her, paid her mahr (money or its equivalent that is
payable to a woman as part of the nuptial agreement), and then divorced her.45
Narratives of Quṭbu’d-Dīn Kākī present this story to show the piety of the saint;
almost all these accounts care less about the woman who got divorced for no
fault. Surprisingly, the Khwāja later in old age married again and had twin sons
from this marriage; the new wife and the children he raised with this wife suf-
fered hunger most of the time.46 Though historicity of the anecdote remains
unestablished, the story has survived through centuries.

41 ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd al-Malik Muttaqī (Edited by Majdi al-Saiyyid Ibrahim). 1992. al-ʿUnwān fi
sulūk an niswān. Qahirah: Maktabat al-Qurʾan.
42 Maulawī ʿAlī Muḥammad (marḥūm). 1881. Hidāyatuʾn niswān. Munshi Nawal Kishore
(place not given), p. 29.
43 Fihrist Kitab Jawāhir-i Farīdī, p. 165; Ruknu’d-Dīn Nizāmī Dihlawī. 1355/1934. Ḥayāt
Quṭbu’l Aqṭāb yaʿnī ḥālāt-i zindagī aur malfūzāt mubārak Quṭbu’l Quṭṭāb Ḥaẓrat Khwāja
Quṭbu’d-Dīn Bakhityār kākī. Dehli: Kutubkhānā Maḥbūbi, p. 3.
44 His full name was Shaikh Aḥmad Ra‌ʾīs. He was a foster brother and disciple of Quṭbu’d-Dīn
Kākī. See Muḥammad ‘Alam Shāh Farīdī. 1912. Mazarāt awliyāʾ-i Dihlī (ḥiṣṣā awwal). Dehli:
Jān-i jahān Press, p. 68.
45 SA, p. 50; Jamālī, p. 19; AA, p. 29; Fihrist Kitab Jawāhir-i Farīdī, p. 166; Mirʿātu’l asrār, p. 685.
46 Jamālī, p. 24.
116 Chapter 4

The most incredible treatment of a Sufi’s bride, even before the consumma-
tion of marriage, comes from the life of Makhdūm ʿAlī Aḥmad Ṣābir (d. 790 or
764), nephew of Bābā Farīd (d. 690/1291), being the son of his sister Bībī Ḥājara.
Makhdūm Ṣābir had spent long years supervising the distribution of food at
the Bābā’s langar khānā, a facility for free meals for whomever comes to eat.47
Bābā Farīd, because of the pleadings of his sister, finally agreed to marry one
of his daughters to his nephew. According to Ḥaqīqat-i Gulzār-i Ṣābirī, a hagi-
ographical account of Shaikh ʿAlī Aḥmad Ṣābir, when the bride entered the
nuptial chamber, sometime past midnight, the groom, i.e., ʿAlī Aḥmad Ṣābir,
enquired who she was. On being told that she was his zauj (couple), the saint
exclaimed, “God is one. What need is there for a couple?” As soon as he uttered
these words, flames erupted, turning the bride into ashes.48 None of the con-
temporary sources refer to this anecdote. The later hagiographies of the saint
carry several stories of his wrath ( jalāl).
Whereas the Delhi-based Chishtī Shaikhs—Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ
and his khalīfa Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī—were rigid celibates,
Khwāja Gīsū Darāz (721/1321–825/1422), the latter’s successor in the Deccan,
despite his disparaging observations about women, lived a married life, raised
a large family, and took great care of them by providing generously for them.
His views that all women talk vain and nonsense and that they are deficient in
intelligence (nuqṣān-i ʿaql), however, remained unchanged.49 In his malfūzāt,
Khwāja Gīsū Darāz argued that a Sufi should not make his wife his disciple
because to whatever degree a wife might be subservient and obedient to her
husband, she would never be able to develop a relationship expected to exist

47 Contemporary accounts about Makhdūm ʿAlī Aḥmad Ṣābir are almost absent. Amīr
Khwurd’s brief reference to one Shaikh ῾Ali Ṣābir is often considered as a reference about
Makhdūm ʿAlī Aḥmad Ṣābir, see SA, p. 185; Ilah Diyā Chishtī. 1906. Risālā Siyaru’l Aqṭāb
(translated in Urdu by Muḥammad ʿAlī Joyā. Kanpur: Nawal Kishore), pp. 165–169; Shah
Muḥammad Ḥasan Ṣābirī. 1856. Ḥaqīqat-i Gulzār-i Ṣābirī, Rampur: Ḥasnī Press, pp. 158–
62; for more anecdotes about Makhdūm ʿAlī Aḥmad Ṣābir, also see Muḥammad Akram
Baraswī. 1993. Iqtibāsu’l-anwār. (pp. 497–581). (Translated by Wāḥid Bakhsh Siyāl. Siyāl
gives the name of the author as Muḥammad Akram Quddūsī). Lahore: Ziau’l Qur’an
Publications; Mushtāq Aḥmad Ambethwī Ṣābirī. 1332/1913, Anwāru’l ʿĀshiqīn. Haiderabad,
Deccan: ʿUsmān Press, pp. 36–48; ῾Abdur Razzāq, ʿAṭāʾ Ḥusain gives the name of his
mother as Bībī Ḥalīma, see Kanzu᾽l Ansāb. Maṭbaʿ Ṣafdarī,1302/1884, p. 68.
48 Ḥaqīqat-i Gulzār-i Ṣābirī, p. 167; Ḥāji Muḥammad Bashīr Ambālwi. 2005. Tazkira
Anwār-i-Ṣābirī: An account of Sabir’s enlightenment. Faisalabad, Pakistan: Daru’l-Eshan,
pp. 20–22.
49 Letter no. 53 to Qāẓi ʿIlmu’d-Dīn and Shaikhzāda and other friends of Gujerat in Khwāja
Ṣadru’d-Dīn Abu’l Fath Saiyyid Muḥammad Gīsū Darāz Chishtī and Saiyyid ʿAta‌ʾ Ḥusain
(Edited) Maktūbāt Imāmu’l ʿĀrifīn Saiyyid Muḥammad Gīsū Darāz. Hyderabad: Barqī
Press. 1362/1943, p. 100.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 117

between a pīr and a murīd. Recalling his personal experience (of making his
wife his murīd), details of which he did not give, he said that he regretted and
repented doing that. He added that as the restrictions placed by the earlier
Sufis in this regard were not void of wisdom (ḥikmat), therefore whosoever
disobeys these instructions repents (peshmān) later on.50 It is significant to
note here that at the time of complaining about his wife, whom we assume was
a veiled woman, and blaming her for displeasing her husband in public, the
Khwāja had spent almost forty-one years of wedded life with this wife. Indeed,
Khwāja Gīsū Darāz professed that a husband’s permission was a prerequisite
for a woman even to repeat Allāh’s attributes.51
The above discussed Sufi perception of wives’ lower status has resulted in
a lingering and persistent impact on the family life of the Muslims of South
Asia. The printed Sufi texts, with their repeated editions, attract large audi-
ence. A noteworthy example is the Pand nāma (the book of counsel) of
Farīdu’d-Dīn ʿAṭṭār (d. 617/1220) of Nishapur. The book has had several Urdu
translations; the earliest one that I could find is titled Chashma‌ʾ-yi faiẓ (the
fountainhead of blessings), which was first translated by one Ḥāmid ʿAli Khan
of Lucknow.52 The versified translation of Pand nāma, under the subheading
of bayan-i mahlikāt (an account of dangerous matters), warns against wives.
At another place, mazammat-i zanān wa ṣubyān (faults keeping company of
women and youth), equating association with women with the world (ṣuḥbat-i
zan, raghbat-i dunyā), one is warned to avoid women and the world because

50 Sharaḥ Jawāmi’l kilam, 12 Shaʿbān, 802/ April 18, 1400, p. 139. It is to be noted that Khwāja
Gīsū Darāz’s wife Bībī Raẓā Khātūn was the daughter of a renowned Sufi scholar of Delhi,
Maulānā Saiyyid Aḥmad bin Jamālu’d-Dīn Ḥusainī. The couple had two sons and three
daughters and a large number of grandchildren. See Shāh Muḥammad ʿAlī Sāmānī.
831/1427. Siyar-i Muḥammadī (along with Urdu translation as al-maʿrūf, Tuḥfa yi-Aḥmadī
by Shāh Nazīr Aḥmad Qādirī). Allahabad: Yūnānī Dawakhāna Press, 1347/1928), p. 21
(henceforth referred to as Siyar-i Muḥammadī); ʿAbdu’l ʿAzīz b. Sher Malik b. Muḥammad
Wāʾiẓī. 1368/1948. Tarīkh-i Ḥabībī wa Tazkirā- ye Murshidī. (Compiled from a photocopy
of the manuscript by Nafees al-Husaini). Lahore: Halqa Maʿrif-i Gīsū Darāz, n. d., p. 18;
Armughān-i Sulṭānī al-maʿrūf sair-i Gulbarga, p. 39.
51 Letter no. 53 to Qāẓi ʿIlmu’d-Dīn and Shaikhzād and other friends of Gujarat in Khwāja
Ṣadru’d-Dīn Abu’l Fath Saiyyid Muḥammad Gīsū Darāz Chishtī and Saiyyid ʿAta‌ʾ Ḥusain
(Edited) Maktūbāt Imāmu’l ʿĀrifīn Saiyyid Muḥammad Gīsū Darāz. Hyderabad: Barqī
Press. 1362 (1943), p. 102.
52 Ḥāmid ʿAli Khan. 1305/1887 (2nd edition in 1889). Chashma‌ʾ-yi faiẓ. Kanpur: Munshi
Nawal Kishore; Another translation in Urdu by Mufti Kafīluʾr Raḥmān ʿUsmānī of Dāru’l
Iftā, Dāru’l Deoband is published by Iqra Center, Lahore (n. d.). A third translation is by
Maulānā Bashīr Aḥmad Siālwī and is published by Maktaba Qadiriyyā, Lahore (1978).
118 Chapter 4

the world is like a deceitful bride (ʿurūs-i bi-wafā). The best thing, according to
the Pand namā, therefore is to remain celibate.53
Not all wives were considered a source of misery for their devout, saintly
husbands. The anecdote of the younger brother of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn,
Najību’d-Dīn Mutawakkil (559–671), and of his wife exemplifies how couples
stand for each other. Najību’d-Dīn Mutawakkil with his family lived in abject
poverty. Once, while returning from Eid prayers, a group of dervishes, assum-
ing that he was a high-ranking Shaikh, followed him to his house in the hope
of getting some sumptuous meal to eat. As there was not a single morsel in
the house, the Shaikh asked his wife to give him her scarf to sell to buy some
edibles, which she did with no hesitation. The scarf, however, being threadbare
and patched, was not worth a dime and the Shaikh had to offer only water
to his visitors.54 Bībī Huzaira Khātūn, the wife of Khwāja Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i
Shakkar, despite her royal background, being the daughter of Sultan Balban,
adopted the lifestyle of her ascetic husband within three days of their mar-
riage. She distributed all her riches and beautiful clothes among the poor and
dressed herself in the garments of the darwishes.55
An episode related by Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī which
confirms his conviction that wives and children cause trouble in one’s life
is about how Abū Saʿīd Aqṭāʾ (the one with an imputed hand) lost his hand.
According to this twice-repeated anecdote, Abū Saʿīd Aqṭāʾ, after his wife,
who could no longer bear hunger after three consecutive days of starvation,
taunted him, went out to the market area to beg for food or money. A virtuous
man gave him some money, but the city’s guards, mistakenly thinking that the
money was stolen, imputed his hand. Weeping and crying he brought back his
imputed hand and, placing it on his prayer rug, bemoaned saying that he was
punished for forgetting Allāh and seeking help from others. The moral of the
story is on the virtues of patience (ṣabr), but the fact remains that the needs
of the spouses and other members of the household, particularly provision of
meals, are genuine needs. By describing these unfulfilled needs as taunts, the
above narrative characterises the wife as the cause of trouble.56
Contrary to the discourse against wives and families of some of the Sufi
Shaikhs, there are instances when even a staunch celibate such as Shaikh
Burhānu’d-Dīn, on whom Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ conferred the walāya

53 Chashma‌ʾ-yi faiẓ, pp. 8, 23, & 43.

54 KM, Majlis 21; SA, p. 98; ʿAlī Asghar Chishtī. 1933/1884. Fihrist Kitab Jawāhir-i Farīdī, Lahore:
Victoria Press, pp. 357–358.
55 Jawāhir-i Farīdī, pp. 216–217.
56 KM, Majlis, 23 and 49.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 119

of the Deccan,57 spoke about the bliss of marital life. Once during his discourse,
Shaikh Burhānu’d-Dīn recalled what his friend Shamsu’d-Dīn, a nephew of
Amīr Ḥasan Sijzī, said about the bliss of family life. He said that a wife and
children are relaxation for a man just like a flower garden. Elucidating fur-
ther, the Shaikh added that it means that whenever a person is exhausted and
depressed by concentration and remembrance, he should spend some time
with his wife. In support of his statement, Shaikh Burhānu’d-Dīn even cited the
example of the Prophet who whenever he felt troubled (malūl), he would call
Ḥaẓrat ʿAʾishā and converse with her till he recovered from exhaustion.58
A more balanced Sufi perception of marriage and wives comes from the
eighteenth-century Naqshbandī Sufi, Mīrzā Mazhar Jān-i-Jānāṅ (martyred in
1195/1781). Jān-i-Jānāṅ argued, as recorded by his ardent disciple Shāh Ghulām
ʿAlī Dihlawī in Maqāmāt-i-Mazharī (compiled in 1796, probably sixteen years
after Mīrza Mazhar’s assassination), that although marriage is the tradition of
the prophets (nikāḥ sunnat-i-aṅbiyā ast), innovative customs (not supported
and approved by the Qurʾān and the Ḥadīth) have weakened the very foun-
dations of marriage; therefore, celibacy and singleness is the best way for the
travellers of the path of Truth. Giving another reason for abstinence from mar-
riage, he pointed out that because of the depleting means of honest living and
the all-pervading environment of ignorance, children often remain deprived
of knowledge and good conduct.59 In his personal life, despite the mental ill-
ness of his wife, which often caused him great stress, Mīrzā Mazhar not only
remained patient and peaceful in his relations with her, but he forgave her for
all the abusive language she used and even asked his disciples to look after
her needs after his death.60 His adopted son, Pīr ʿAlī, a relative of his wife
who lived with him, did nothing to earn a living but instead survived on char-
ity, yet he had at least two wives.61 Also, his favourite disciple and successor,
Ḥaẓrat Sanāʾu’llah Pānīpatī (d. 1225/1810), had two wives. However, Sanāʾu’llah
Pānīpatī maintained peaceful relations in his family.62
The best example of not merely honouring and respecting but of publicly
acknowledging the superiority of a wife comes from the life of Ḥaẓrat Shaikh

57 Ᾱzād Bilgramī refers to Burhānu’d-Dīn as Ṣāḥib walāyat-i-dakkan. See Rawẓatu’l Awliyāʾ.

Maṭbaʿ ʿIjāz Ṣafdarī (No place), (1310/1892). p. 4.
58 Majlis on 11 Ṣafar, 735/October 11, 1334, Ruknu᾽d-Dīn ʿImād Kāshānī. Nafā᾽isu᾽l Anfās
(MS.) Khuldabad (compiled in 1331–1337), p. 85; Āzād Bilgrāmī. Rawẓatu’l Awliyāʾ, p. 11.
59 Shāh Ghulām ʿAli Dihlawī. 1309/ 1892. Maqāmāt-i Mazharī. Dihlī: Maṭba᾽i Mujtabāʾī, p. 43.
60 Maqāmāt-i Mazharī, p. 59.
61 See several references in ῾Abdur Razzāq Quraishi. 1966. Makātīb Mirzā Mazhar. Bombay:
῾Alawi Book Depot.
62 Makātīb Mirzā Mazhar, p. 142; also, Maqamāt-i Mazhariyya, p. 402, f. n. 26.
120 Chapter 4

Bandagī Miaṅ Nizāmu’d-Dīn Ambethwī (909/1504–979/1571–1572). A Sufi mas-

ter of gnostic and charismatic qualities, Ḥaẓrat Bandagī Miaṅ had great respect
for his wife, Ḥaẓrat Bībī Makhdūma, a Sufi woman of unparalleled virtues and
merits. As he learnt several spiritual exercises from her, Ḥaẓrat Bandagī Miaṅ
acknowledged her as his murshid.63

4.3 Marital Life and Sex

Dichotomic and antithetical views on marital life and sex are the most com-
mon theme found in Sufi discourses. While one group of the Shaikhs warned
their disciples to keep themselves safe from the lures of women, the others
got married, had multiple spouses, and raised several children. A close study
of the Sufi texts, mainly tazkirāt, malfūẓ̣āt, and manuals on Sufi ādāb (books
on cultural idioms and books of etiquette) illustrate these opposite views.
The following section looks at some selective cases that demonstrate these
conflicting views. Shaikh Ẓiāu’d-Dīn Abū Najīb ʿAbdu’l Qādir Suhrāwardī’s
(490/1097–563/1168) work, kitāb ādābu’l-murīdīn, a popular text for novices in
the Sufi circle of South Asia, has laid down rules for marriage. According to
Suhrāwardī’s ādāb-i tazwīj (rules for marriage), based upon a Tradition of the
Prophet narrated by Abū Huraira, says that a Sufi should marry if he has the
capacity to provide for a wife; if not, he should fast as fasts are the best way to
control one’s desires by weakening the sensuality (shahwat).64
However, some of the Sufis preferred to remain celibate on account of other
reasons than the above Blessed Tradition. Perhaps one reason for preferring
celibacy could be the Sufis’ perception that women were a hurdle in their path
and hence women and marriage must be avoided at all costs. To Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ, celibacy came as a natural path, and he did not have to struggle to con-
trol any of his urges. The story of his most loyal disciple and later his Khalīfa,
Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī, however, is quite different. To
control his sexual urges (nafs-i muzāḥmat), he practiced serious exercises and
went through miserable times. Drinking large amounts of lemon juice (āb-i
līmū) almost brought him to the verge of death (maʿraz-i halākat).65 Ḥāmid

63 Muḥammad Ṭufail Aḥmad Miṣbāḥī. 2015. Mullā Aḥmad Jīwan Amethwī- Ḥayāt aur
khidmāt. Purnea: Maulānā Ghulām Jilānī, p. 186.
64 Bandā Nawāz, and Saiyyid ῾Atta‌ʾ Ḥusain. 1939. Tarjuma ādābu’l-murīdīn (Persian transla-
tion of Suhrawardī’s Arabic work Ᾱdābu’l-murīdīn). Hyderabad: Maṭba-yi Intiẓāmī, p. 285.
65 SA, p. 241.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 121

Qalandar records that often the Shaikh would break his fasts by chewing the
leaves of saṅbhalu, a wild plant whose leaves are known to curb sexual urges.66
Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb (d. 1338), a disciple of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ who
received khirqa-i kāmil67 (the perfect Sufi cloak or robe) from his mentor and
was sent to the wilayā of the Deccan, also remained celibate like his Shaikh and
pir-bhāiʾ (the fellow disciple, that is Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd). Since his
early childhood, Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb was so deeply preoccupied with Divine
love that he would spend hours in seclusion repeating kalima ṭayyab (the creed
of Islam). His devotion and piety grew so intense that at the age of thirteen he
resolved to spend his life in Allāh’s remembrance and declared he would not
marry. His determination grew so rigid that if ever he had nocturnal discharge,
the following day he would keep a fast. When his mother thought of getting
him married, as a dutiful son, instead of stopping his mother, Burhānu’d-Dīn
Gharīb applied a different strategy. On his own admission, to dissuade his
mother from her insistence on his marriage, Shaikh Burhānu’d-Dīn starved
himself, which made him so frail and weak that he could hardly lift his neck
upwards to look at the sky above. The mother, thus, had to give up her plans to
get him married and excused him.68
Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb not only lived as a celibate, he also guided others to
control and suppress their sexual urges. In section 25 of Aḥsanu’l aqwāl, under
the heading of dafaʿ shahwat (eliminating carnal desires), he recommended a
spiritual formula to those troubled by carnal desires (nafs zaḥmat dihad). Such
a person, he said, after reciting thrice Qurʾān’s verse 114, should blow it on his
index finger and then strike his left thigh with this hand. This would result in
decreasing sexual urges (shahwat kam kard) and would guard the traveller on
the path of spiritual attainments.69
The life of Saiyyid Muḥammad bin Yūsuf al-Ḥusainī, known as Khwāja
Bandā Nawāz Gīsū Darāz (721/1321–825/1422), offers a case of opposing views.
A favourite murīd and khalīfa of Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i
Dihlī, Gīsū Darāz, unlike his mentor, went through acute physical pain while

66 Jamālī, p. 282.
67 Imadu’d-Din Maḥmūd Iṣāmī. 1948. Futuḥus-Salāṭīn (Edited by A.S. Usha). Madras: Madras
University, p. 8.
68 Ghulām ʿAlī Āzād Ḥusainī Chishtī Bilgrāmī. 1310/1892. Rawẓatu’l Awliyāʾ. Bombay: Maṭbaʿ
ʿIjāz Ṣafdarī, p. 5.
69 Ḥammādu’d-Dīn Kāshānī, Aḥsanu’l aqwāl, p. 120 (I have translated these excerpts from a
photocopy of the Persian manuscript of Aḥsanu’l aqwāl from the uploaded internet ver-
sion by Professor Carl Ernst www.academia.edu/12537498/Ahsan_al-aqwal). I have also
consulted the published Urdu translation of the MS, Aḥsanu’l aqwāl al-maʿrūf bah afzalu’l
maqāl by Muḥammad ʿAbu’l Majīd (Bombay: Maṭbaʿ-i Jahaṅgīrī, 1342/1923).
122 Chapter 4

unsuccessfully suppressing his sexual drives.70 The incident of the Khwāja’s

predicaments in his efforts to suppress or express his sex drive is reported by
his biographer, ʿAbdul ʿAzīz bin Sher Malik, a noble at the court of Ahmad
Shāh Bahmani (d. 1457), in his double-titled Persian treatise, Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī
wa Tazkira-yi Murshidī/khwariq-i Banda Nawāz, completed in 849/1446,
about twenty-nine years after the passing away of the illustrious Khwāja.71
Chapter 2 of Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī, quoting Khwāja Gīsū Darāz, relates how virgin-
hood and absence of the experience of sexual intercourse with women played
havoc with his well-being:

Ḥaẓrat Makhdūm says, “I reached the age of thirty and did not know
about intercourse (suḥbat-i zanān chigūna ast) with women and how
one’s mood (raghbat) gets motivated towards sexual drive (shāhwat).
Afterwards, parmiyo began to trouble me (zahmat-i parmiyo ghalbā
kard).72 Youth and the pressure of desire ( jawanī wa gharūr-i shahwat)
resulted in several other concerns and anxieties. Subsequently, with the
consensus and agreement (ijmāʿ wa ittifāq) of all the wise and eminent
persons, including experienced and skilled Muslim physicians and heal-
ers, Maulānā ʿAlāu’d-Dīn bought a jāriyā (a bondmaid) and sent her to my
respected mother. My Mother and Maulānā ʿAlāu’d-Dīn personally forced
me (bar man taklīf kardand). Well, what else could I have done as all the
time, except while praying or listening to the samāʿ, the sex desire always
appeared overpowering (hamesha ghalbā-yi shāhwat). Thus, out of com-
pulsion (zarūrat) for the purpose of cohabitation (ṣuḥbat), I called the
jāriyā. At that time, this task looked far too difficult. I wanted to cohabit
with her but wondered (mutafakkir būdam) that how does sexual inter-
course (mubāsharat) is done. After a while, with a little bit of common

70 Khwāja Gīsū Darāz was born in Delhi, left for the Deccan in 1398 and arrived there during
the reign of Sultan Firuz Shāh Bahmani (r.1397–1422). He settled in Gulbarga around 1400
at the invitation of the Sultan.
71 The original manuscript of Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī was prepared in consultation with the Khwāja’s
son and successor, Khwāja Asghar Ḥusainī (d. 828/1424) and other family members,
descendants and close companions. See Nawwāb Māʿshūq Yār Jang Bahādur, Tarjama-i
Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī, Hyderabad Deccan: Ittiḥād Press, 1368/1948; An earlier description of this
Persian manuscript was given by Syed Hasan Askari in a paper, ‘Tazkira-i-murshidi—a
rare malfūz of the 15th century Sufi Saint of Gulbarga’ published in the Proceedings of the
Indian Historical Commission, 1952, pp. 179–188.
72 Steingass translates parmiyo as an affection of bladder and strangury. See Steingass, F.
2000. A comprehensive Persian-English dictionary including the Arabic words and phrases
to be met within Persian literature: being Johnson and Richardson’s Persian, Arabic &
English dictionary. Lahore: Sang-e-Meel Publications, p. 244.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 123

sense and knack (bāfahm wa firāsat wā qiyās), I knew how to do it. In

short, once it was over (bʿad az farāgh), I felt relaxed and reposed (āsa‌ʾīsh
darman paidā āmad). I felt hungry too (gursangī zor āward).”73

Later, after years of marriage and having several children and grandchildren,
Khwāja Gīsū Darāz often commented in his spiritual discourses that if he had
experienced sex with women and had had children before traversing the path
of spirituality, he would not have acquired perfection (iktisāb-i kamalāt).74
Past the age of eighty (Gīsū Darāz died at the age of 101 years), the Khwāja used
to claim, according to his biographer, that though he gave up (inqiṭaʿkardand)
sexual activity he still claimed to have the potency of iftitāh-i bikr (to deprive
of virginity).75
Despite being married and having arranged marriages of children and
grandchildren, Khwāja Gīsū Darāz continued with his antimarriage rhetoric,
arguing that marriage makes a man destitute and impoverished. In addition,
marriage drains a man’s energy day by day and finally ends in its complete
depletion, he argued. Warning his disciples, he instructed them to keep away
from marriage as marriage would distant them from their final destination, i.e.,
nearness to the Divine.76 In reality, however, the contempt expressed by the
Khwāja against marriage was not shared either by his children or by his disci-
ples. None of his progeny heeded his warnings as all got married. This reminds
one of the words of Tor Andrae who classified such antimarriage statements of
the mystics as “pious snobbery.”77
Most Sufis, while expressing their views on a topic related either to this
world or the next one, addressed the male audience and had male needs or
desires in mind. One such example is of Shaikh Sharfu’d-Dīn Aḥmad ibn Yāhyā
Manerī (d. 485/1381), known as Makhdūm-i Jahān (the spiritual teacher of the
realm), of the Firdawsī silsila and one of the well-known Sufis of Hindustan

73 ʿAbdul ʿAzīz Sher Malik bin Muḥammad Wāʾīzī. Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī Tazkira-yi murshidi. Lahore:
Halqa Maʿārif-i Gīsū Darāz, n. d., pp. 17–18. (Henceforth, referred to as Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī);
Maulawī Muḥammad Sulṭān. 1343/1924. Armughān-i Sulṭānī al-maʿrūf sair-i Gulbarga.
Hyderabad: ʿĀzam Steam Press. p. 39. (Henceforth, referred to as Armughān-i Sulṭānī).
74 Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī, p. 18; Armughān-i Sulṭānī, p. 39.
75 Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī, pp. 99–101.
76 Shabbīr Ḥasan Chishtī Nizami. 2002. Sīrat-i pāk Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Saiyyid Muḥammad Gīsū
Darāz Bandānawāz (Malfūzāt of Gīsū Darāz Bandā Nawāz translated into Urdu). Lahore:
‘Azīm Sons. P. 105.
77 Tor Andrae (Translated by Birgitta Sharpe) 1987. In the Garden of Myrtles: Studies in Early
Islamic Mysticism. Albany: State University of New York Press, p. 49.
124 Chapter 4

whose manāqib (virtues) are well accounted.78 In addition to his discourses,

Manerī extensively used the medium of letter writing for the spiritual direc-
tion and correction (irshād wā taṅbih) of his disciples.79 In a letter, titled dar
ghalaṭ gāh-i mardumān (some frequent misconception of people), addressed
to Maulānā Muzaffar Shams Balkhī (d. 1400), one of his disciples and
successors,80 explaining that sensuality is part of human nature, he wrote that
nowhere Sharīʿat has ruled to get rid of sensuality (shahwat) and characteris-
tics of human nature. He further argued that if sensuality is lost, cure should
be sought for it (ʿilāj bayad kard). Sensuality, he emphasised, not only lets a
person take care of his family, children, and worldly possessions, it also ensures
begetting children in abundance, which thus protects a person’s name for gen-
erations to come.81 In another letter addressed to Shamsu’d-Dīn, under the title
‘faẓl-i aṇbiyāʾ bar awliyāʾ (excellence of the Prophets over the friends of Allāh),
Shaikh Manerī argued that though to get pleasure in eating and in women is
in man’s nature, an excellent man strives to control his natural desires and is
not tricked by Satan. Thus, such a man has no carnal desires (shahwat nabūd)
and does not suffer from any anxiety for wife or children (na andūh zan wa
farzand).82 Manerī’s views remind one of al-Ghazali’s exposition on human
desires for food and sex when he wrote that there were two types of desires:
one, the desire of the stomach (shahwat al bāṭin), and second, “the desire for
sex and voracious appetite for women (shahwat al farj).”83 Interestingly in his
personal life, Shaikh Sharfu’d-Dīn Manerī had a different experience. While he

78 AA, pp. 113–118; for a poetical homage, see Shāh Amīn Aḥmad Firdawsī. 1301/1884. Gul-i
Firdaws dar aḥwāl khwajgān-i firdaws. Lucknow: Munshi Nawal Kishore, pp. 111–125.
79 Letter No. 4 to Brother Shamsu’d-Dīn on the theme of tajdīd-i tawba. Shaikh Sharafu’d-Dīn
Yaḥyā Manerī quds sirahu. 1885. Maktūbāt Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Sharfuddīn Yāḥyā Manerī Quds
Sirāhu. Lucknow: Munshī Nawal Kishore, p. 16. Shamsu’d-Dīn, from Chausa, was a Qāẓi
by profession. As most of the time he could not attend the spiritual sessions of Shaikh
Sharfuddīn Yaḥyā Manerī, he was instructed through letters. Thus, 98 out of the 100 letters
included in Maktūbāt are addressed to him.
80 Shāh Shuʿaib Firdawsī. 1313/1895. Manāqibu’l Asfiyyāʾ. Calcutta: Maṭba῾ Nūru’l Āfāq,
pp. 147–52; S.A.A. Rizvi. 1978. A History of Sufism in India. Vol. 1, pp. 237–39. For a short
biography of Muzaffar Shams Balkhī, see Paul Jackson, ‘Muzaffar Shams Balkhi,’ in
N. Hanif. 2002. Biographical Encyclopaedia of Sufis: Central Asia and Middle East. New
Delhi: Sarup & Sons, p. 280.
81 Maktūbāt Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Sharafuddīn Yāḥyā Manerī Quds Sirāhu. p. 65; also, Maktūbāt
Shāh Sharafuddīn Yahya Manerī: A rare manuscript in Farsi digitalized by the University
of Kashmir. https://archive.org/details/SadMaktubatOfShaykhYahyaManeriManuscript
downloaded in July 2013.
82 Letter no. 20 in Maktūbāt Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Sharfuddīn Yāḥyā Manerī Quds Sirāhu, p. 73.
83 Tim J. Winter. 1995. On Disputing the Soul and on Breaking the Two Desires, Books 22 and 23
of the Religious Sciences. Cambridge: The Islamic Text Society.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 125

was busy seeking knowledge in Sonargaon as a young person, he fell ill (marẓ
ḥādis shudā būd). On the recommendation of local physicians that sexual
intercourse was the only remedy for this ailment (dawā-yi īṅ marẓ jamaʿ ast),
he got married.84
More than two hundred years later, another Chishtī Sufi, Shaikh Nizāmu’d-
Dīn Aurangābādī (d. 1730), following the tradition of Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb
and Khwāja Gīsū Darāz, moved from north India to the Deccan and settled
in Aurangābād as the khalifā of his Shaikh, Shāh Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī
(d. 1143/1729).85 He went through the same physical torment for not marrying
early. Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Aurangābādī, in compliance with the instructions
of his pīr, so aptly described by Ᾱzād Bilgramī as miʿmār-i-qulūb (the designer
of the hearts),86 remained unmarried until he was struck by gonorrhoea. The
pīr, on knowing about this ailment, in a letter said that in the opinion of the
wise (ḥukamāʾ), marriage is a cure for this ailment; he should, therefore, now
get married and even suggested some suitable girls of his own family (dar
qabīlā mā) for marriage, especially a daughter of his paternal uncle. Until mar-
riage takes place, Shāh Kalīmu’llah also suggested to have a kanīz during this
interim period according to the need (baqadr-i ẓarūrat), until the harmful
effects (muẓarrāt) of gonorrhoea (suzāk) are no more.87 Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn,
however, married someone from the Deccan, not once, but twice, and raised
a large family. Interestingly, one of his wives happened to be from the family
of Khwāja Gīsū Darāz who had the same history of recovery from a similar ail-
ment with the help of a slave girl bought expressly for the purpose of curing
his physical ailment.88
Yūsuf Gadā,89 a fourteenth-century Sufi disciple of the famous Chishtī
Sufi, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī, wrote Tuḥfā-i-naṣāʾiḥ (A present

84 Shāh Shuʿaib Firdawsī. 1313/1895. Manāqibu’l Asfiyyāʾ. Calcutta: Maṭbaʿ Nūru’l Āfāq, p. 132.
Maksud Ahmad Khan in his PhD (1989) dissertation, ‘Firdausi silsila during the Sultanate
period’ quotes from a Ms of Manāqibu’l Asfiyyāʾ (Ms 183, f.83, b) that Manerī established
this relationship with his concubine (kanīz).
85 For Shāh Kalīmu’llah, see Khalīq Aḥmad Nizāmi. 1946. Ḥaẓrat Shāh Kalīmu’llah Dihlawī.
Dehli: Maktaba Burhān.
86 Ghulām ʿAlī Ᾱzād Bilgrāmī. 1910. Daftar-i awwal-i Ma‌ʾāṣiru’l-kirām. Agra: Maṭbaʿ Mufīd-i
ʿĀm, p. 42.
87 Shāh Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī. 1315/1897. Maktūbāt-i Kalīmī. Dehli: Maktabā Mujtabai᾽,
Letters no. 27 and 29, pp. 30–31, 32.
88 For a notice on Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn, see Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyāʾ, jild awwal, pp. 463–66; also,
Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 2007. Tārīkh-i mashāʾikh-i Chisht. Karachi: Oxford University
Press, pp. 144–145.
89 For a short biographical notice on Yūsuf Gadā, see Nabi Hadi. 1995. Dictionary of
Indo-Persian literature. New Delhi: Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, pp. 629–30.
126 Chapter 4

of counsels or ethical instructions) sometime after 1356 for his young son in
verse form and called this naṣā’iḥ or advice. Among several pieces of advice in
Tuḥfā-i-naṣāʾiḥ, one is on marriage, which “shows an ideal of almost total male
dominance and female subservience, limited only by the Islamic prohibitions
on extramarital sex.” In this poem, Yūsuf Gadā advises his son that if his wife
is not obedient and patient, he should “divorce her quickly.” He then lists good
qualities and bad traits that his son should look for in a wife. The next section
of the work lays down rules for sexual intercourse. Interestingly, these views
of Yūsuf Gadā are quite the opposite of the views held by his Sufi guide and
mentor, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī. However, Tuḥfā-i-naṣāʾiḥ gained
so much popularity that a seventeenth-century Bengali writer and poet, Syed
Alaol (d. 1680), who later joined the Qādirī Sufi silsila, translated it in 1664 into
Bengali.90 A majority of the readers, though, were not deterred by Yūsuf Gadā’s
extremely unfavourable views towards women. As Digby writes, “the number
of manuscript copies [Tuḥfā-i-naṣāʾiḥ] recorded exceeds that of any Ṣūfī devo-
tional work of the Sultanate period; and the number of recorded lithographed
editions greatly exceeds even those of Amīr Ḥasan’s Fawāʾid al fuʾād.”91 The
views of Yūsuf Gadā, thus, moving beyond several centuries, reached a wider
audience.92

4.4 Perception of Women by Seventeenth- and

Eighteenth-Century Sufis

During this period, two personalities are relevant to our study: Shaikh Aḥmad
Sirhindī (d. 1624)93 and Shaikh ʿAbdu’l Ḥaqq Muḥaddis Dihlawī (d. 1642), a Sufi
of the Qādirī silsila. Muḥaddis Dihlawī was an erudite scholar of Ḥadīth and
a prolific writer.94 Muḥaddis Dihlawī’s major contribution is his biographical
compendium of South Asian Sufis, Akhbāru’l Akhyār fī asrāru’l-abrār, written

90 Muhammad Mojlum Khan. 2013.The Muslim Heritage of Bengal. Leicestershire: Kube

Publishing, pp. 4652.
91 Simon Digby. 1984. ‘The Tuhfā-i-nasāʾh of Yūsuf Gadā: An Ethical Treatise in Verse from
the Late Fourteenth-Century Delhi Sultanate.’ In Moral Conduct and Authority, The Place
of ADAB in South Asian Islam. Edited by Barbara Daly Metcalf. Berkeley: University of
California Press. pp. 91–123, here p. 92.
92 Saiyid Athar Abbas Rizvi. 1978. A History of Sufism in India. vol. 1., p. 372.
93 For his biographical note, see Badaoni, 1978. Muntakhab ut-tawārikh (Translated by Sir
Wolseley Haig). Karachi: Karimsons, pp. 167–72; also, Ghulām ʿAlī Ᾱzād Bilgrāmī, 1910.
Daftar-i awwal-i Maʿāṣir al-kirām. Agra: Maṭbaʿ Mufīd-i ʿĀm, pp. 200–201.
94 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 1964. Ḥayāt-i Shaikh ʿAbdul-Ḥaqq Muḥaddis Dihlawī. Dehlī:
Nadwatu’l-Muṣannifīn, pp. 129–30.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 127

before 996/1588 and revised later in 999/1590–1591. Not only did Muḥaddis
Dihlawī include Sufi women, albeit only a few (only five to be exact, and that
too at the end of the work), but nowhere in this work did he use any deroga-
tory comments about women. Indeed, on the contrary, he praised the virtues
of these friends of Allāh using laudable phraseology.
In sharp contrast to the dignified representation of women by Muḥaddis
Dihlawī is his contemporary Shaikh Aḥmad Sirhindī (d. 1624), known as
Mujaddid Alf-i Sānī (the rejuvenator of the second millennium). Aḥmad
Sirhindī’s tirade against women, condemning and accusing them of social ills
that plagued seventeenth-century Muslim South Asia, not only won many an
ardent believer, some being Sufi Shaikhs with huge and increasing following,
but its impact continues.
Initiated into the Naqshbandī Sufi silsila by Khwāja Bāqī Billah (d. 1012/1603),
who arrived in India during the end of Emperor Akbar’s reign, Aḥmad Sirhindī
later came to claim for himself and for his three immediate successors the posi-
tion of qayyūm (the highest pole) in Sufi hierarchy.95 In addition to several
books and tracts, he was a prolific letter (maktūbāt) writer.96 These undated
letters, almost 534 in number, were originally written in Persian and addressed
to more than two hundred followers and friends. Later compiled as Maktubāt-i
Rabbānī, they are a storehouse of the Naqshbandī discourses on various issues
pertaining to sharīʿā, faith, belief, and practices. Two of these letters, addressed
to women, read like a Naqshbandī manifesto on women. Before studying these
two letters in some detail, let us look at Sirhindī’s gender perception within his
comprehension of the essence of Islam.
Anchored to the view that women are lowly born and men are superior,
Aḥmad Sirhindī’s remedy for the rejuvenation of the Muslim society was adher-
ence to the orthodox way of life, instead of the synthesised cultural milieu that
had come into existence over the centuries and which was actively patronized
by the Mughals. An important segment of this revivalist pattern, spearheaded
by Aḥmad Sirhindī, was keeping women under male control. Viewing Muslims

95 For Bāqī Billah’s life and charismatic powers, see volume two of Ḥaẓrāt-ul Quds, a hagio-
graphical account, written by Badru’d-Dīn Sirhindī, the Shaikh’s disciple and a long-time
companion. See Badru’d-Dīn ibn Muḥammad Ibrāhīm Sirhindī. Ḥaẓrāt al-quds-daftar
dom (Urdu translation by ʿIrfān Aḥmad Khan, 1922). Lahore: Mashhur ῾Ām Press. For
modern works, see Annemarie Schimmel’s Mystical Dimensions of Islam, p. 369; also,
Annemarie Schimmel. 1994. Deciphering the Signs of God: a phenomenological approach
to Islam. Albany: State University of New York Press, p. 196; Masood Ali Khan and S. Ram.
2003. Encyclopaedia of Sufism. New Delhi: Anmol Publications, p. 31.
96 Translated into English, Arabic, Turkish, and Urdu these translations are accessible in
print form and soft copies on the internet.
128 Chapter 4

of South Asia through male vision, he believed that Muslim women are incit-
ers of heretical and idolatrous behaviour. This perception of women led him to
assume that Islamic marriage is polygamous in nature.97 In letter number 191
addressed to ʿAbdur Raḥīm Khān Khānān (1556–1627), on the topic of sharīʿā
and the actions permitted (mubahāt)98 by it, Sirhindī not only approved mar-
riage to four women at a time but also approved access to as many concu-
bines as a man could afford to buy. He also lauded the Islamic jurisprudence
for divorcing one wife to bring in a new wife, thus adjusting the number of
women (wives) through divorce (ṭalāq rā wasīlā-yi tabdīl nisā῾). He also held
that wearing of gold ornaments was permissible to women as it was benefi-
cial to men. He argued that, after all, gold was male investment. Similarly, he
argued that wearing of silk and ornaments by women is in the interest of men
as women’s adornments cause pleasure to men. He thus argued that men, as
masters of women, would be the ultimate owners of this gold and would seek
pleasure by watching their well-decorated and adorned wives (munāfaʿ āṅ nīz
bā mardāṅ ast).99
Returning to the two letters addressed to women by Sirhindī, letter 34 is
addressed to the mother of Mīr Muḥammad Amīn on the subject of dar
naṣiḥat wā targhīb bar zikr-i ilāhī wā ijtināb az muḥabbat-i duniyā (on advising
and encouraging remembrance of Allāh and refraining from the adulation of
the world).100 Sirhindī tells her that the more she practices the path of sharīʿā,
the more her intensity of Allāh’s remembrance will grow. He counsels her to

97 For a rationalistic approach to the contentious issue of polygamy, see Fazlur Rahman and
Ebrahim Moosa. 2009. Major Themes of the Qur’ān. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago
Press, especially, pp. 47–48.
98 Letter No. 191 in Shaikh Aḥmad Sirhindi Mujaddid Alfsāni. Maktūbāt Imām-i Rabbānī
Ḥaẓrat Mujaddid Alfsānī (ḥissā duyum). Karachi: Educational Press, 1397/1977, pp. 304–
306. Mubāh (plural mubāhāt) is a permissible act with no praise or blame and the com-
mission or the commission of which does not make a person sinner. For more on this, see
Muhammad Assad. 1961. The Principles of the State and Government in Islam. Berkeley:
California State University, pp. 13–15.
99 For comments on Sirhindi’s view, see M. Athar Ali, 2012. ‘Elements of social justice in
medieval thought.’ ln Recording the Progress of Indian History: Symposia Papers of the
Indian History Congress, 1992–2010. Edited by Saiyid Zaheer Hussain Jafri. Delhi, Primus
Books, pp. 193–207.
100 Letter no. 34, in Shaikh Aḥmad Sirhindi Mujaddid Alf-i sānī. Maktūbāt Imām-i Rabbānī
Ḥaẓrat mujaddid Alf-i sānī (ḥiṣṣā duyum), pp. 355–56. Referred to as ‘mother of Mir
Muhammad Amin’, she was the wife of Sirhindī’s Khalifa, Mīr Muhammad Nuʿmān.
For Mīr Nuʿmān’s biographical notice, see Khwāja Muḥammad Hāshim Kishmī. 1890.
Zubdat al-muqāmāt. Kānpūr: Maṭbaʿ Munshī Nawal Kishore (Urdu translation by
Ghulam Mustafa Khan and Maulānā Abul Fath Saghīru’d-Dīn. Maṭbaʿ Nuʿmānia, Sialkot,
1407/1987), pp. 454–69.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 129

keep herself busy in Allāh’s remembrance (mustaghriq zikr-i Ilāhī). Closing the
letter, he says that these rules were discussed with her when he met with her
personally (bashumā dar ḥuẓūr ham gufta shudā ast). The letter says nothing
about the details of the meeting or whether she was his disciple and had taken
an oath of allegiance.
The second letter, letter 41, is addressed to an anonymous pious woman
(yak-i az ṣaliḥāt) and gives important advice to women (naṣāʾiḥ ẓarūriya), par-
ticularly in the context of the oath of allegiance (baiʿāt). Rules of baiʿāt are dis-
cussed later in this book, under the section on the oath of allegiance. Here, we
look at Sirhindī’s perception of women and the oath of allegiance. He castigates
Muslim women because, in his opinion, they are more prone to blameworthy
actions than men are. These sinful acts of women, performed because of their
utter stupidity and height of ignorance (kamāl-i jahl), are in violation of the
conditions on which the Prophet accepted the “pledge of women.”101 Among
these innovations (bidāʿt), which Sirhindī believed to be more common among
Indian Muslim women than men, he argued that women acted thus because of
their fallacy of following the traditions of the infidels (marāsim-i ahl-i shirk). In
addition, he insisted that women are prone to use abusive language, behave in
heretical ways, and disobey Islamic ways of living. He also condemned women
for their abundant (bisyār) base traits and malicious nature (ẓamāʾim wa
akhlāq-i radiya). Women, in his estimation, were guilty of spending their hus-
bands’ wealth without their permission (amwāl-i shuaharāṅ be izn) and thus
extremely wasting it. To him these women, by acting as thieves (sāriqān), were
guilty of the crime of embezzlement (khiyānat).102
In Sirhindī’s estimation, women, in addition to committing shirk, were pri-
marily guilty of adulterous acts, because most likely men commit adultery only
with women’s consent (ḥuṣūl zinā dar aghlab bā tawassuṭ-i ḥuṣūl raẓā ast az
zanān). Thus absolving men of the moral and civil crime, Sirhindī advocated
that men commit adultery under women’s influence (mardāṅ dar īṅ ʿamal tābʿ
zanān bashand).103
Sadly, Sirhindī did not know that while he was condemning women for
ignorance and malicious nature, one woman, Būbū Rāstī, was lecturing men
and teaching them the secrets of Divine Love as expounded by Fahkhru’d-Dīn
῾Irāqī (d. 1289) in his Lamaʿat (Divine Flashes). Among those who attended

101 Yohanan Friedmann. 1971. Shaykh Ahmad Sirhindi: An Outline of His Thought and a Study
of His Image in the Eyes of Posterity. Montreal: McGill University Institute of Islamic
Studies.
102 Letter no. 41 in Shaikh Aḥmad Sirhindi Mujaddid Alfsāni. Maktūbāt Imām-i Rabbānī
Ḥaẓrat Mujaddid Alfsānī (ḥiṣṣā duyum), pp. 362–366.
103 Ibid, pp. 365–366.
130 Chapter 4

one such lecture were ʿAbdur Raḥīm Khān-khānān, his son Darāb Khan, and
Masīhu’l Awliyāʾ.104
Shāh Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī (1650–1729), khalīfa of Medina-based Shaikh
Yahya Madani (d. 1689) was a Chishtī Sufi-scholar and was known for his toler-
ant disposition and lived an austere life in Delhi, which in his time was suffering
from political, moral, and economic deprivation. Strictly adhering to the Sufi
way of tawakkul (trust in God) in his personal life, Shāh Kalīmu’llah, through
his written and spoken words, intensified a campaign for simplicity and frugal-
ity. Though married and with children, he advocated celibacy as a Sufi way and
persuaded his disciples to refrain from marriage. Thus, arguing that women rob
men of their faith, he warned his favourite disciple and trusted Khalīfa, Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Aurangābādī, “Do not marry, if there is no urgency” (agar iḥtiyāj
nabāshad hargiz kadkhudā nihā shud), because “this community [women] is
that of the highway robbers of faith (īṅ qaum rāhzanān-i dīn ast).”105

4.5 Attitude towards Children

In the Sufi texts, a female child is often subsumed under the Persian word far-
zand, which commonly refers to male offspring, but its usage is also permis-
sible for daughters as well as for all human beings.106 To most Sufis, family, and
in particular children, were a hurdle in their pursuit of abstinence (zuhd)—the
first step to spiritual attainments. For those who remained celibate, the ques-
tion of taking care of children did not exist. Some Sufis, however, though follow-
ing the Tradition of the Prophet, married and raised their families but shirked
the responsibility of looking after their children. In his chapter on “Concerning
the manner of those who are married and those who have children,” addressed
to male Sufis in his much-read Sufi treatise (risāla), al-Sarrāj’s (d. 988) views
are relevant to this section. Citing an episode from the life of Fatḥ al-Mawṣilī
(d. 835) of Baghdad,107 who had a wife and children, al-Sarrāj narrates that one

104 See Biographical notice of Būbū Rāstī in Part 2 of this book.

105 Letter no. 30, Shāh Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī. 1315/1897. Maktūbāt-i Kalīmī. Dehli: Maktabā-i
Mujtaba‌ʾi. P. 33.
106 See, for instance, FF Majlis 20, 27th of Jamādiu’l Ᾱkhir, 708/1308 in which this word is used
for the children of Adam.
107 al-Mawṣilī, a companion of al-Sarrāj Saqaṭī (d. 227/841) was a minor transmitter of ḥadīth.
For more on his life, see Farīdu’d-Dīn ʿAṭṭār. 1997. Tazkirat al-awliyāʾ (Urdu translation).
Lahore: al-Farūq Book Foundation, pp. 181–182; Laury Silvers. “al-Fatḥ al-Mawṣilī, Abu
Nasr Abu Muhammad b. Saʿīd.” Encyclopaedia of Islam, Vol. 3. (Ed. by Kate Fleet, et al.),
Brill Online, 2016.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 131

day when al-Mawṣilī kissed his son, he heard a heavenly voice saying, “O Fatḥ,
art not thou ashamed to love another besides Me?” His wife, too, was a woman
of piety and practiced abstinence from worldly attachments.108 Al-Sarrāj, how-
ever, counselled that “a married Sufi must not commit his wife and children to
the care of God, but must provide for their needs unless they are in the same
spiritual state as he is.”109
From the South Asian Sufis, my first selection comes from the life events
of Shaikh Quṭbu’d-Dīn Bakhtiyār Kākī (d. 1235), a father figure for the Sufis of
the Chishtī ṭarīqa. This Ush-born Sufi, brought up and educated by his wid-
owed mother, travelled to Baghdad where he met Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī
(d. 1236) and took baiʿāt at his hands. He arrived in India during the time of
Sultan Iltutmish (r. 1211–1236) when the Sultanate of Delhi was striving to
emerge as the Qubbatu’l Islam (literally meaning dome or arch, here mean-
ing sanctuary of Islam).110 Almost all the primary Sufi texts of South Asia refer
to the sayings of Shaikh Quṭbu’d-Dīn Bakhtiyār Kākī with utmost reverence;
therefore, the words of the Shaikh carry great weight and influence. Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, describing the highest degree of Shaikh Quṭbu’d-Dīn
Kākī’s constant occupation of remembering Allāh (mashghūlī), narrates the
incidence of the death of Kākī’s youngest son. When the Shaikh heard the
laments of the child’s mother, the father within the Shaikh was tormented
and he began rubbing his hands with pain (dast bar dast mālīdan girift). At
this, seeing the Shaikh grieving (tāʾssuf kardan), Badru’d-Dīn Ghaznawī,111 who
was present there, asked why he was grieving. The Shaikh answered, “Now I
remember that had I prayed to Allāh for the life of my son, my supplications
would have been answered.” The story, however, does not end here. Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Din Awliyāʾ’s observation, while narrating this incident, is more
revealing. He said that so intense was his (Shaikh Quṭbu’d-Dīn’s) absorption in
remembering the Friend (istighrāq-i īshāṇ dar yād-i dost) that he did not know
either about the life or death of his son.112

108 Abū Naṣr al-Sarrāj and Reynold A. Nicholson. 1914. The Kitāb Al-Lumaʿ Fi’l-taṣawwuf of
Abū Naṣr ʿAbdallah B. ʿAlí Al-Sarrāj Al-Ṭūsī. Leyden: E.J. Brill, p. 55; for a reference to his
wife, see Hellmut Ritter, John O’Kane, and Bernd Radtke. 2013. The Ocean of the Soul: Men,
the World, and God in the Stories of Farīd Al-Dīn ‘aṭṭār. Leiden: Brill, p. 249.
109 The Kitāb Al-Lumaʿ, p. 55.
110 Ruknu᾽d-Dīn Nizāmi Dihlawī. 1355/1934. Ḥayāt Quṭbu’l Aqṭāb yʿānī ḥālāt-i zindagī aur
malfūzāt mubārak Quṭbu’l Quṭṭāb Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Quṭbu’d-Dīn Bakhityār Kākī. Dehli:
Kutubkhānā Maḥbūbi, pp. 4–6.
111 Shaikh Badru’d-Dīn Ghaznawī (d. 1258) was a khalifā of Shaikh Quṭbu’d-Dīn. For his short
biography, see Nizami, K.A., Tārīkh-i Mashāʾikh-i Chisht, pp. 196–97.
112 FF, Assembly 18, 7 Ziqʿad, 710/1311; also, SA, p. 49; Jamali, p. 24.
132 Chapter 4

Of the most celebrated Sufis revered for their austerity (zuhd), piety (taqwā),
and poverty ( faqr)—the basic merits for seeking riḍā (contentment)—Shaikh
Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar lived in Ajodhan, now Pakpattan, for about thirty
years, from 1236 until his death in 1265. The Bābā (father), as the Shaikh is known
until this day, used to spend his life away from the everyday hustle and bustle of
his family, outside the city’s environs, in a wooded area where spouses and chil-
dren could cause no interference. Although the Shaikh was spending most of
his time either in the woods or in the mosque lost in the remembrance of Allāh
(mashghūlī), several sons and daughters were born to him. On the authority
of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn, Bābā’s spiritual successor, Mīr Khwurd writes that he
had several wives (ḥaram bisyār būd).113 Ḥamīd Qalandar in Khairu’l Majālis,
malfuẓ of Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn, records that in one session when the discourse
turned towards the Bābā, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn said that the Bābā had two or
three wives with whom he had several children (khidmat-i Shaikh rā du ḥaram
būd yā sih ḥaram).114 Whenever a maidservant (dāyā) would inform him that
his wives and children were famished, the Shaikh, instead of doing anything
for their relief, used to comment in his assemblies, “What can I do about it?” He
is also reported to have said that such complaints entered into his one ear and
exited from the other (darīn gosh āmadi wa badīn gosh raftī).115
The Shaikh’s intense love for God kept him undisturbed even when he heard
about any of his children’s demise due to malnutrition and hunger. One time,
Mīr Khwurd narrates, one of his wives came and told him that today one of his
sons passed away because of hunger (pisr az sabab gursnagī dar ma’riz halākat
shudā ast) and the only response of the Shaikh was what could he, a human
being, do if that was fated to happen (Masʿūd bandā chih kund agar taqdīr
ḥaqq dar āyad).116 These episodes, while they confirm the Shaikh’s intense
remembrance of Allāh, do raise several queries. Did he not know that one of
the requirements of marriage is for husbands and fathers to provide food and
shelter to their wives and children? More importantly, children cannot provide
for their own needs, particularly their food and shelter. In a patriarchal society,
as it was in the time of the Shaikh, women could hardly find means for self-
support, and therefore to leave them to a life of privation and loss of children

113 SA, p. 66. Shāh Muḥammad Ḥasan Ṣābirī in Ḥaqīqat-i Gulzār-i Ṣābirī (1856, Rampur:
Ḥasnī Press) says that Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn had three wives, Mujibunnisa‌ʾ sister of Shaikh
Zakarīyya Sindhi, Bībī Khātūn, daughter of Sultan Balban, and Umm-i-Kulsūm, and had
fourteen sons and five daughters, some of them died in infancy, pp. 161–62, 167. KM, Majlis
25 also mentions that one of his daughters was blind (kor).
114 KM, Majlis 25; Ḥaqīqat-i Gulzār-i Ṣābirī, pp. 162, 167.
115 KM, Majlis 25.
116 SA, p. 67.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 133

raises critical questions which are hard to adequately answer. To say that his
wives and children were or should have been as patient (ṣābir) as he was, is not
supported by the above reports.
Strangely, another episode about Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar and
his sons, narrated by Ḥāmid Qalandar, gives an opposite view of the Shaikh’s
paternal care for his sons, now grown up and in the manhood phase. Once
these grownup agriculturist sons of the Shaikh experienced trouble at the
hands of a local mutaṣarrif (revenue collector/auditor) of Ajodhan. Maulānā
Shihābu’d-Dīn, the eldest son of the Shaikh, complained to the Shaikh who
was performing ablution (waẓū), saying that what was the benefit of all his
spiritual powers (īṅ buzurgi wa karāmāt-i tū) for them if a local administra-
tor could dare harass them. The Shaikh, who earlier was not disturbed by the
deaths of his children, now was moved by his sons’ complaint of harassment.
He instantly took hold of his stick (ʿaṣāʾbar girift) and simply moved it (ishārat
kard) in a way as if he was pushing someone away and told his sons to go home.
Meanwhile, the mutaṣarrif was suddenly struck by a severe abdominal pain
and was brought to the Shaikh to be pardoned. The Shaikh, otherwise known
for his piety, commented “tīr bāhadaf rasīd” (the arrow has hit its mark). On
being taken to his home, the man died.117
A good number of the Sufis did not agree that love for children decreases or
hinders their love for God. Foremost among this group is Sharfu’d-Dīn Yaḥyā
Manerī of the Firdawsī silsila. In his malfūz, there are several references to his
views regarding affectionate behaviour towards children. He endorsed that
love for one’s parents, children, and wife is not against the laws of Islam nor
does it create any difference in one’s love for God.118 However, a contradictory
image of Sharfu’d-Dīn Manerī emerges in an episode recorded in Manāqibu’l
Aṣfiyya‌ʾ, a tazkira of the Firdawsī Sufis written by Shāh Shuʿaib Firdawsī, a
nephew and disciple of Sharafu’d-Dīn Manerī. According to this narrative,
when Manerī was a student in Sonargaon, a son was born to him, his first child.
He left the son to his (Manerī’s) mother Bībī Raẓiya, saying that she should take
care of the child and consider as if he was no longer alive. He then left for Delhi
in search of the right path.119 Interestingly, Sharfu’d-Dīn Manerī’s views regard-
ing the treatment of young virgin girls after their death is rather different, con-
sidering it from the perspectives of children’s rights. In response to a question

117 KM, Majlis, 53; Jamali, p. 37.

118 Sharfu’d-Dīn Ahmad Ibn-Yahya Manerī. 2011. Madan al- Mʿāni. (Urdu Translation by
Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Shāh Qasīmu’d-Dīn Aḥmad Sharfi Firdawsī). Nalanda: Maktaba Sharf,
Khānqah Muʿazzam, pp. 360–361.
119 Shāh Shuʿaib Firdawsī. 1313/1895. Manāqibu’l Aṣfiyāʾ. Calcutta: Maṭbaʿ Nūrʾul Āfāq, p. 132.
134 Chapter 4

by Qāẓi Khan that what would happen to young virgin girls (dukhtarān bikr) on
the day of resurrection, Sharfu’d-Dīn Manerī said that Allāh would hand them
to any of the unmarried men of His choice.120

4.6 The Caring Sufis

Although all Sufis were loving and compassionate, Maulānā Naqīʾud-Dīn

Awadhī’s (d. 835/1431) story is an inspiring one. An extremely pious person
(ba ghāyat muttaqī), Maulānā Naqīʾud-Dīn Awadhī’, despite his preoccupa-
tion with saintly pursuits, took his responsibility for his wife and children seri-
ously. Muḥaddis Dihlawī relates an anecdote that once, while the Maulānā
was studying a book somewhere at a hidden away place, as was his routine
practice, a group of abdāl approached him and insisted that he should join
their company and live with them (miyān-e mān bāshī). To this, the Maulānā’s
response was that, contrary to them (the abdāl) who had no family obligations,
he had a wife and children to look after and care for (man bār-e zan wa farzand
dāram), and therefore it was not possible for him.121 This two-line anecdote
indeed speaks volumes about the marital and family obligations that some of
the less-acclaimed Sufis practiced and preached.
Within the plethora of negativity towards women, one also comes across,
though rarely, narratives about the Sufis’ humane and compassionate attitude
towards women. One such account is about Shaikh ʿAla‌ʾu’l Ḥaqq bin Asʿadi
Lahori Bangali (d. 800/1398),122 a khalīfa of the Chishtī Sufi, Shaikh Sirāju’d-Dīn
ʿUsmān, popularly known as Akhī Sirāj of Pandua, Bengal.123 The story says that
once Shaikh ʿAla‌ʾu’l Ḥaqq saw his son, Shaikh Nūru’l Ḥaqq, known as Quṭb-i
ʿĀlam (d. 813/1410),124 fetching water and axing wood for fuel for his Khānqāh
in Pandua, Bengal. The father, who was also his son’s spiritual mentor, told him
that instead of doing this labour, he should help women by lifting their heavy
water-filled pots at a well where the earth had become too slippery for women
to carry the heavy pots. As commanded, Shaikh Quṭb-i ʿĀlam continued to
perform the task for the next four years twice a day—in the morning and in
the afternoon—and helped women, all nāmḥaram for him. Similarly, another
anecdote relates that Shaikh Quṭb-i ʿĀlam once visited an old widow at her

120 Zain Badr ʿArabī Firdawsī (compiler). (Khwān-i pur niʿmat, malfūz of Sharfu’d-Dīn Aḥmad
ibn Yaḥyā Manerī, Majlis 34). Patna: Maṭbaʿ Aḥmadī, pp. 80–81.
121 AA, p. 159.
122 For his short biographical sketch, see AA, 139–40.
123 Ibid, pp. 84–85.
124 For his life sketch, see AA, pp. 147–50.
The Sufi Gaze: Sufi Perception of Family 135

house and discussed with her matters of dīn. Coming out of her house with
tearful eyes, he is reported to have said that if he would be forgiven, it would
be because of this old woman (baṭufail-i ʿajūza).125 It should be noted here that
Shaikh Quṭb-i ʿĀlam, a zāhid par excellence, was a prolific letter writer, and
chose his pen to spread love and devotion for the Divine and rejection of all
worldly injustices. In his treatment of women, he taught the essence of zuhd.126
125 AA, p. 148; also, Azkār-i Abrār, p. 105.
126 For more on Shaikh Quṭb-i ʿĀlam and his treatise on Chishtī mysticism see, S.A. Latif,
“Munis-ul Fuqara—A 15th Century Manual on Mysticism” in Davahuti (Edited) Bias in
Indian Historiography. (pp. 347–351), Delhi: S.K. Publications (1980).
 Chapter 5

The Sufi Gaze: Interaction with Maidservants

and Women of Ill Repute

Women in most societies are constrained to live with little or limited options.
These restrictions appear to be harsher as we move backwards in our study
of societies structured on male hierarchical authority. Authority and power,
though, are concepts prone to fluid perceptions and definitions; however, in
essence, they are simply placement of one human being over another in a verti-
cal order. There is very little valid and uncontested historical evidence project-
ing an egalitarian image that could fit well within the framework of the human
rights agenda as it is emerging now. This section, though, is not a critique of the
state of human rights in the period under survey here in this book; logically,
however, it is within the parameters of this study to look at the interaction that
the Sufis had with two other classes of women, the slave girls and maidservants
and the prostitutes. The active presence of these two classes of women was a
norm of the society as their services brought worldly comfort and ease. Below,
under two separate sections, is presented a brief overview of the presence of
these two classes of women in the Sufi discourses and their lived experiences.

5.1 Kanīz/kanīzak: Slave Girls and Maidservants

Medieval Islamic literature is replete with stories and narratives of maidser-

vants or handmaids bought and sold by persons of means for household jobs
as well as for the fulfilment and gratification of sexual needs. Not all bonded
or purchased women, though, served their masters’ carnal needs. The story of
Rābiʿa al-ʿAdawiyya, a slave girl who by virtue of her asceticism and love for
Allāh has the most prominent place within the Sufi canon, illustrates it best.1
As a note of caution, the word Kanīz/ kanīzak, a Persian word, carries several
meanings which are often used interchangeably. Among these meanings, in
addition to its most common usage for a slave girl, are a maidservant, a virgin,
and a young girl.

1 Margaret Smith. 1994. Muslim Women Mystics—The Life and Work of Rābiʿa and Other Women
Mystics of Islam. Oxford: Oneworld.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_007

Interaction with Maidservants and Women of Ill Repute 137

Let me begin this section with a unique story of a different kind of relation-
ship that existed between a Sufi woman and her maidservant. This story is of a
maidservant or slave girl who also lived as a companion and as the only other
person in the household of Bībī Fāṭima Sām (d. 643/1246), who lived and died
in Delhi without a family of her own. A gnostic and renunciate, Bībī Fāṭima
Sām earned the deep respect of her contemporary male Sufis who knew her
personally, visited her, and spent hours in her company learning from her
spiritual discourses. Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ once quoted his mentor,
Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn, saying about Bībī Fāṭima Sām that “mashghūlī īṅ ʿaurat
ma dah mard-i kāmil ast” (the amount of this one woman’s remembrance of
Allāh equals that of ten perfect [perfect Sufi] men).2 Ḥamīd Qalandar, on the
authority of Khwāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī, narrates that Bībī Fāṭima
Sām’s maidservant (kanīzak) performed a double service. She was a household
servant, preparing meals and taking care of Bībī Fāṭima Sām, and also earning
money for the Bībī and to support herself. During daytime, she used to earn
money by doing some kind of low-paid work (mazdūrī) and in the evening
would get meals, which according to the narrative appear to have been low-
cost meals consisting of barley, home-cooked bread, and some kind of gruel,
for Bībī Fāṭima Sām and herself.3 This anonymous kanīzak indeed epitomises
the best virtues that a friend of Allāh could ever acquire.
References to the use of slave girls and bondmaids for sexual gratifica-
tion, though rare in the discourses, conversations, and biographies of South
Asian Sufi men, do exist. However, the issue of sale, purchase, and having sex
and begetting children with them without a marriage contact is discussed in
compendiums of religious decrees ( fatāwā) in response to queries. Thus, for
instance, Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz of Delhi (d. 1824) added a separate section named
Risālā baiʿ kanīzān (tract on the purchase of slave girls) in his Fatāwā ʿAzīzī.
A scholar of Ḥadīth, fiqh (jurisprudence) and a Naqshbandī-Mujaddīdyya
Sufi, Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz lists six categories of bondmaids and slaves, their sale,
and the permissibility to have sex with them and to have ownership of chil-
dren born of them. In most cases, the opinions of Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz were in
the affirmative.4 In response to a disciple’s query regarding the permissible
number of bondmaids (mubāḥ bāndiāṅ) one could possess, his answer was
“no limit of the numbers. Whatever might be the number, all are lawful ( jāʾiz)

2 Jamālī, p. 101.
3 KM, Majlis 41.
4 Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz. 1322/1904. Fatāwā-yi ʿAzīzī (ḥiṣṣā awwal). Dihlī: Maṭbaʿ Mujtabāʾī, pp. 67–68,
39, 40; also, Shāh ʿAbdul Azīz Muḥaddis Dihlawī. 1408/1988. Fatāwā ʿAzīzī (Kāmil). Karachi:
Saʿīd Company, pp. 557–59.
138 Chapter 5

and allowed (mubāḥ).”5 He also advocated that sexual contact with a bond-
maid from lands of war (dāru᾽l ḥarb ki launḍi) was permissible without legal
marriage (ba-dūn nikāḥ ṣuḥbat karna jāʾiz hoga).6 The geographical limits of
dāru’l ḥarb, as visualised by him, spanned from Calcutta to Lahore, excluding
areas such as Rampur (state) and Lucknow, places noted for their predominant
Muslim social milieu.7
References to female slaves of different ages, young and old, emerge as one
reads the primary sources of South Asian history, including the Sufi texts.
Even when bought explicitly not for the purpose of indulgence in extramarital
activities, norms regarding male attitudes towards them remained surprisingly
indifferent and lax, even within the environs of a khānqāh, a ground specific
for training a novice to conquer his nafs first before learning other lessons of
taṣawwuf. Some, however, lost their control by a mere fleeting glimpse of a
beautiful kanīz even in such places where the very air was filled with zuhd and
taqwā. One such slippage occurred in the serene environment of the khānqāh
of Shaikh Abū Bakr Ṭūsī Qalandarī (d. 639/1249), situated on the banks of the
river Yamuna. Pious Sufis, such as Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʿ, had visited
this khānqāh, one of the earliest ones in Delhi. Shaikh Abū Bakr Ṭūsī was
known for holding sumptuous feasts (ẓiyāfat hāʾi shigarf) and probably had
a large kitchen.8 In the story narrated by Khwāja Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb in
Ahsanu’l-aqwāl, his malfūzāt compiled by Ḥammād Kashānī, once when Shaikh
Abū Bakr Ṭūsī was heading his langar (free meal), he saw a murīd sitting back
and not partaking of the meal. When asked why he was not eating, his answer
was, “I would eat only if you give me the kanīz of your kitchen (maṭbakh) to
whom my heart is attracted.” To this, the Shaikh said that he would get for him
another girl, as this maid was not worthy (lāʾiq) of him. The man, satisfied with
this response, began to gratify his other hunger and began to eat. Later, Abū
Bakr Ṭūsī ordered him thrown out for being a liar (kāzib) because if he were
sincere (ṣādīq) in his longing for this slave girl, he would not have been enam-
oured ( firifta) by the offer of another one.9 Thus, the fault of the murid was
his lack of sincerity and not his impudent demand to have a kanīz for himself,
even though the kanīz was not even aware of this whole transaction. One, how-
ever, wonders at the presence of a young kanīz in an all-male establishment.

5 Shāh ʿAbdu’l ʿAzīz, Muḥaddis Dihlawī. 1897. Malfūzāt Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz. (Translated by
Maulawī ʿAzmat Ilāhī). Meerut: Maṭbaʿ Hāshmi, [first published in 1896], p. 53. [Another edi-
tion of this book was published in 1960 by Pakistan Educational Publishers Ltd., Karachi].
6 Ibid, p. 53.
7 Fatāwā ʿAzīzī (Kāmil). Karachi: Saʿīd Company, pp. 122–23.
8 SA, p. 181.
9 Aḥsanu’l aqwāl, p. 73.
Interaction with Maidservants and Women of Ill Repute 139

The household of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar, though living in acute

poverty, had maidservants. An account in Jawāhir-i Farīdī, although considered
not very credible by some, says that one of the wives of the Shaikh, a daughter
of Sultan Balban, brought three hundred slave girls with her. The Shaikh told
her to return all and chose to retain only two, named Shukro and Shādo, who
had royal ancestry (az nasl-i shahān būd). According to some sources, consid-
ered weak, Shaikh Farīd had children with them also.10 Another anecdote in
Jawāhir-i Farīdī relates that once Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn expressed his displea-
sure when he came to know that the Suhrawardi saint, Shaikh Bahāʾud-Dīn
Zakarīyya (d. 1262), had beaten his kanīz on a mere suspicion of pilfering a
small box.11 Shaikh Zakarīyya is said to have another kanīz, whose ravishing
looks and her ways of conversation could make men lose their composure
(hosh).12 The story of Bībī Zulaikha, the mother of Nizāmu’d-Din Awliyā’ and
of her kanīzak (young slave girl) who ran away and returned due to the former’s
supplications, is yet another such example.13
Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar had amiable relations with one of the
slave women of Maulānā Jamālu’d-Dīn Hāṅswī, a favourite disciple and spiri-
tual deputy of Ganj-i Shakkar. Being a person of great piety (ba ghāyat ṣāliḥ), he
respectfully used to address her as mādar-i mominān (mother of the Faithful).
Often, the Shaikh would communicate with her to enquire about the well-
being of Maulānā Jamālu’d-Dīn, conversing in the local dialect. Subsequent
to the demise of Maulānā Jamālu’d-Dīn, the Shaikh appointed Jamālu’d-Dīn’s
young son as his deputy and handed over the khilāfat nāma, deputy’s regalia,
including the muṣallā (prayer mat) and ʿaṣa (staff) to this slave woman.14
Some other slave girls were gifted as commodities as part of a bride’s trous-
seau. Thus, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn’s mother’s slave girl, given to her in her dowry,
used to bring food for the young Naṣīru’d-Dīn at his mother’s behest.15 Khwāja
Bandā Nawāz Gīsū Darāz (721/1321–825/1422), compared to the Chishtīs of
Delhi, had more resources and perhaps had more maidservants or slave girls in
his household. Thus, we are told that he was assisted by a launḍi (slave girl) in

10 ʿAlī Asghar Chishtī. Fihrist Kitab Jawāhir-i Farīdī, pp. 217–218; Najmu’d-Dīn Sulaimānī
writes that the saint kept Shādo and Shukro as his kanīz. See Manāqibu᾽l Maḥbūbain
(Urdu translation by Iftikhar Ahmad Chishti). Faisalabad: Chistiyya Academy, 1987. (First
published in 1278/1861, Maṭbaʿ Muḥammadī Lahore), p. 93; Ruknu’d-Dīn Nizāmi Dihlawī.
1355/1934. Ḥayāt Quṭbu’l Aqṭāb yʿānī ḥālāt-i zindagī aur malfūzāt mubārak Quṭbu’l Quṭṭāb
Ḥaẓrat Khwajā Quṭbu’d-Dīn Bakhityār kākī. Dehli: Kutubkhānā Mahḥbūbī, p. 61.
11 Fihrist Kitab Jawāhir-i Farīdī, p. 198.
12 Fihrist Kitab Jawāhir-i Farīdī, p. 266.
13 SA, p. 160.
14 Ibid, pp. 180–183.
15 Sharaḥ Jawāmiu’l-kilam, Majlis Ramaẓān 10, 802/May 5, 1400, p. 276.
140 Chapter 5

the performance of his waẓū.16 Saiyyid Muḥammad Akbar Ḥusainī, the son and
khalīfā of Khwāja Bandā Nawāz Gīsū Darāz, began compiling Jawāmiʿulʾ-kilam,
malfuẓ of the Khwāja, in 802/1400 when the Khwāja was nearing the age
of eighty years. The Jawāmiʿulʾ-kilam records that on Thursday, 24 Shaʿbān
802/19 April 1400, in the session held after the Chāsht prayers,17 “begetting
children with the slave girls” was the topic of discussion. The Khwāja, whose
first experience of sex was with a slave girl procured specifically for his sexual
needs—after great deliberations of the learned and the local physicians and
with the approval of his mother—warned his disciples and other devotees not to
marry or have children with slave girls (kanīz). He argued, in a rather unusually
graphic idiom, “To beget children from slave girls is not prudent for a sensible
and virtuous man because how could one trust a woman whose trouser-string
is not secure for a moment. A child born of such a belly carries thousands of
qualms.” Referring to a saying of Caliph ʿUmar in which he is reported to have
said that to marry the slave girls because the “Arab’s zeal for honour and the
‘Ajam’s wisdom is present in children born of them,” the Khwāja observed that
such women are found nowhere in Hindustan. Compared to the slave girls of
Ḥaẓrat ʿUmar’s time, “none is more depraved and lewd than those who come
from different small towns and cities of Hindustan; they have neither shame
nor honour, nor ability; their proximity ruins sense and nerves. Well, if there is
some exigency, it does not matter than as just going to a lavatory is a need. To
marry them and have children with them is not what a sensible and a prudent
person would do.”18
Contrary to this disparaging attitude towards young females who have been
forced into bondage through adversity and exploitation, a mild apologetic
acceptance of slave girls taken as wives comes from the eighteenth-century
Chishtī Sufi, Ḥaẓrat Shāh Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī (d. 1143/1729). Much averse
to marriage, Shāh Kalīmu’llah persuaded his disciples to refrain from mar-
riage as he was convinced that marriage causes distraction (izdiwāj maūjib-i
tashwīsh ast). He himself, on the contrary, got married while still a student (dar
awāʾil taḥsīl-i ʿilm azwāj kardā būd). When the wife passed away and before he
could finish his studies, he felt as if a burden was lifted from his heart (qabl az

16 Armughān-i Sulṭānī, p. 71; Waẓū or ablution is a requirement for offering the five daily
prayers.
17 Chāsht, a supererogatory (nafl) prayer is offered between sunrise and meridian.
18 Majlis 10, Shʿabān 802, Sharaḥ Jawāmiu’l-kilam, p. 188. It is interesting to note a similar
view of Ibn Battuta who also held a low opinion about female slaves found in India and
thought that they were low-priced because they were ‘dirty and know nothing of the town
manners.’ See The Reḥla of ibn Baṭuṭa (India, Maldives Islands and Ceylon). Translation
and commentary by Mahdi Husain. Baroda: Oriental Institute. 1976, p. 123.
Interaction with Maidservants and Women of Ill Repute 141

farāgh-i ʿilm az īn bār fārigh shud). In a letter to his spiritual deputy in the
Deccan, Shāh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Aurangābādi (d. 1730) counselled that to have
peace and tranquillity (āsūdagi) in life, one should marry a woman of reput-
edly noble lineage (dar aṣālat wa najābat maʿrūf būd) but from a slightly lower
economic class (dar marṭaba-yi dunyāwī yak darajā kam). Citing his personal
experience, he further wrote that, subsequent to the demise of his wife, who
belonged to a respected family, he freed his kanīz whom he had bought earlier
and married her, lived comfortably (ārām) with her, and raised four sons and
five daughters. In support of marrying a slave girl after freeing her, he presented
an argument that the mothers of Ḥaẓrat Ismāʿīl, Ḥaẓrat Zainu’l Ābidīn, Imām
Bāqir, and Imām Jaʿfar Ṣādiq were all bought with money (hamā diram kharīda
būdand).19 Thus, by marrying a former slave girl of his household, he claimed
that he also earned the merit of following the way of some of the noblest fig-
ures of Muslim legacy.
In contrast to the above narratives, few anecdotes also exemplify humane
relationship with slaves, particularly with female slaves. Of these, one that best
illustrates the God-fearing attribute of the Sufi way is of Ḥasan Sijzi. It is worth
noticing that this incident occurred while Ḥasan Sijzi had not yet entered the
discipleship of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ.20 The story is about Malīḥ, a
slave of Ḥasan Sijzi, whom he freed and brought to the second Majlis held on
8 Shʿabān 707/2 February 1308 and who also entered the discipleship of Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ in this session.21 While in Deogir with Ḥasan Sijzi, this
Malīḥ, himself a slave, bought a child bondmaid (kanīzak bachchā) for himself
for five tankas. At the time of the army (lashkar) leaving Deogir, the parents
of the child weeping and crying, presented ten tankas to Malīḥ to buy back
their daughter. Ḥasan Sijzi’s heart melted at the sight of the parental agony.
He bought the little girl by paying ten tankas to Malīḥ, and freed and handed
the child bondmaid back to her parents. He also gave them ten tankas from
his own pocket. This story moved Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ and his eyes
got moistened (chasm purāb kard) and he said to Ḥasan Sijzi, “you have done
well” (nekū kardi).22 Ḥasan Sijzi added that he, while freeing the little slave
girl, acted upon the tradition of Maulānā ʿAlāʾud-Dīn Uṣūlī. At this, Shaikh

19 Letter no. 107 to Shāh Nizāmu’d-Dīn in Shāh Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī. 1315/1897.

Maktūbāt-i Kalīmī. Dehli: Maktaba-i Mujtaba‌ʾi, pp. 83–84; also, Najmu᾽d-Dīn Sulaimānī.
1987. Manāqibu’l Maḥbūbīn (Urdu translation) p. 121.
20 Ḥasan Sijzi most probably became a disciple of the Shaikh in 706/1306 when he was past
fifty years in age. Masʿūd ʿAli Mahwī. 1352/1933. Dīwān Ḥasan Sijzi Dihlawī. Hyderabad,
Deccan: Maktaba Ibrāhīmiyā.
21 FF, Majlis 2, Shʿabān 8, 707/1308.
22 FF, Majlis 52, Ramazān, 11, 718/1318.
142 Chapter 5

Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ narrated the story of Maulānā ʿAlāʾud-Dīn Uṣūlī who,

moved by the tears of his aged bondmaid whom he had recently purchased in
Badayun, freed her and took her to a place from which she could easily find her
way to her house.23
A similar story is repeated in Akhbāru’l akhyār under the name of Maulānā
Naqīʾud-Dīn Awadhī (d. 835/1431) with little variation. According to this anec-
dote, once when his female slave whom he had purchased was crying, the
Maulānā asked the reason for her grieving. On being told that she was badly
missing her children, he took her out of his house in the darkness of midnight
and let her go to her home. Next day, finding the slave missing, Maulānā’s wife
got worried and, hearing the whole episode, got very angry with the Maulānā
(ʿitāb āghāz kard). The episode ended on a more celebratory note, when later,
the slave woman returned with her children and husband and, bowing down
at the feet of the Maulānā, said, “we all are your slaves.” The magnanimous Sufi,
despite his wife’s wrath, in the true spirit of his creed, declared at once, “I set
you all free!”24

5.2 Women of Ill Repute

Sufi texts under review have several references to women whom either the
Sufi masters and their followers (murīdīn) or the scribes of their narratives call
ʿaurat-i bad karāh (women with bad deeds). We know well that to oust Sulṭān
Raẓiya (1236–1240) from power, and perhaps to erase her name from the pub-
lic’s collective memory, too, the male elites of the court of the Delhi Sultanate
took recourse to charge her with moral laxity. Thus, tales of women of bad
character require critical evaluation before one accepts the written word.
Some anecdotes of women of bad deeds could have been used metaphorically
as a parable to highlight their redemption from a life of sin and to demonstrate
the perennial strife between good and evil.
In essence, the Sufi message is that the way to return to righteousness and
goodness remains open always. The door of repentance and turning towards
God (tawba) is open for all, including women of ill-repute. Thus, in the Assembly
held on 20 Jamādiu’l-awwal 720/1320, the theme of which was tawba and the
tāʾīb (repentance and the repentant), Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ narrated
the anecdote of a beautiful public singer (muṭribā) who repented (tāʾīb) before
Shaikh Shihābu’d Dīn ʿUmar Suhrawardi and afterwards even performed the

23 Ibid Majlis 34, Shawwāl, 9,714/1315; also, AA, p. 76.

24 AA, p. 159.
Interaction with Maidservants and Women of Ill Repute 143

Ḥajj. On her return from the holy Kʿaba, the governor of Hamadan, despite her
resistance, forced her to sing in his court. Finally, when she began to sing and
repeated a particular couplet, first the governor and then everyone else present
there repented (tāʾīb shud).25 The moral of the story is that the door of repen-
tance remains open for all and that even a public entertainer who has repented
could be the redeemer of men in power who force others to commit acts of sin.
Surprisingly, despite social derogation and religious dictums against women
who earned their livelihood through public entertainment, dance perfor-
mances for male audiences, and sex trade with male clients, we come across
incidences of proximity between the Sufis and public entertainers and women
considered of bad character. Shaikh Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb recounts one such
tale with some detail in Aḥsanu’l aqwāl in section 21, under the heading dar
bayān faẓilat ittifāq wa iḥsān wa tāsīr-i āṅ (an account of the virtues of har-
mony and excellence and their effects). As this section is under the heading
of iḥsān, one of the basic virtues aspired to by a Sufi,26 I would here present
the story in some detail, though it would add to the length of the book. A way-
farer arrived at a township where there was no public facility for travellers to
stay. People told him of a bad woman (bad kārāh) who offered hospitality to
whosoever came to the town. The traveller went to her. Serving him food and
water, this woman laid out a bed for him to rest and said that if he needed
physical comfort, she was available for him (gar khidmat-i-badanī bāshad man
hāẓir-am). The traveller, however, took no advantage of this offer, but at the
time of departure he asked her whether she really liked this kind of service.
At this, her answer was that as it was her innate intention (khāṣṣiyat-i niyyat)
to provide comfort (rāḥat) to others, therefore, she offers this service (physi-
cal comfort). The traveller went away. It so happened that after some time he
returned to the same place and, finding this woman nowhere, enquired after
her and was told that a rich Saiyyid (ʿalawī) happened to visit the town and
stayed at her place. Finding her beautiful, of good actions, and ready to serve
( jamīla wa nikukār wa khidmatgār), he married her and transferred all his
wealth to her, telling her that she could spend as much as she liked in the name
of Allāh (rāh-i ḥaqq). Concluding this story, the Shaikh sermonised that even
a bad woman, through the blessings (barkat) of her generosity, munificence
(sakhāwat), and good intentions (niyyat-i khūb), was saved and became the
wife of a family member of the Prophet ( farzand-i rasūl).27 Such an anecdote

25 FF, Majlis 11, Jamādiu’l awwal, 720/1320.

26 The Qurʾan (Sura 7: 56) guides a believer ‘For the Mercy of Allāh is (always) near to those
who do good’ (iḥsān).
27 Ḥammādu’d-Dīn Kāshānī, Aḥsanu’l aqwāl, pp. 92–93.
144 Chapter 5

could be read as merely symbolic to show the difference between good and
bad. A deeper comprehension of such accounts, however, reveals the social
ostracisation of women on account of their actual and assumed bad deeds.
A similar anecdote narrated by Khwāja Gīsū Darāz is reported by his son
who was present at the session held on 24 Shawwāl 802. The Khwāja, who
was highly critical of women of low ancestry, bondmaids, and slave girls as he
considered them to be persons of lewd habits, on this occasion told his audi-
ence that even a whore ( fāḥisha) could do deeds that would bestow the Divine
Mercy upon her. In this episode, the Khwāja related the actions of a woman
of ill-repute in sheltering and feeding a dog, and suffering of the worst kind of
scabies. These actions made her and her house immune from fire, while other
houses were burnt to ashes.28 (This story could also be read as a much-needed
counsel for treating animals with compassion.)
Several centuries later, in the late nineteenth century, Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz of
Delhi (1745–1823), when asked to explain a masʾala (legal question) whether
offering funeral prayers for the prostitutes or sex workers (kasbī)29 was per-
missible or not, his answer was, “Do you offer funeral prayers for men who
are their [prostitutes’] clients (āshnā)?”30 When the man answered, “yes,
we do,” Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz told him, “then, offer the funeral prayers for them
[prostitutes] too.”31 Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz had rather a soft and humane attitude
towards the prostitutes. One incident that illustrates it further concerns a
disciple who enquired about the permissibility of accepting food offered by
a d́ om32 and a prostitute. Shāh Ṣāḥib decreed that anything offered by a d́ om
is not permissible (ḥarām). However, if an adulteress and lecherous prostitute
(tawāʾif, zānia, fāḥisha) offers food, purchased by taking a loan, it is permissible
(ḥalāl).33 Indeed, Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz was willing to initiate prostitutes as his
disciples. For example, in response to a query about initiating prostitutes while
engaged in their profession (kasb), he referred to one well-known prostitute,
Bahjo, who worked in Delhi and, as he said, had great ʿaqīdat (faith/devotion)
and irādat (spiritual devotion) for him. Although he was not sure whether she

28 Sharaḥ Jawāmiu’l-kilam, Majlis on 24 Shawwāl 802/June 18, 1400, pp. 410–11.

29 The word Kasbī, derived from the word kasb, which means paid work or profession, is
used for artisans, labourers, and also prostitutes, thus listing prostitution in the category
of paid work.
30 The word āshnā means friends.
31 Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz. Malfūzāt Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz (including Kamālāt-i ʿAzīzī), 1960, p. 232;
Ẓahīru’d-Dīn Saiyyid Aḥmad. 1872. Majmuāʿ Ḥālāt-i ʿAzīzī (ḥiṣṣā awwal). Dehli: Maṭbaʿ
Mujtabāʾī, p. 8.
32 D́ oms belong to the lowest of the untouchable caste of India.
33 Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz. Malfūzāt Shāh ʿAbdul Azīz (including Kamālāt-i ʿAzīzī), 1960, p. 125.
Interaction with Maidservants and Women of Ill Repute 145

was still active in her profession or business (peshā yā kasb), her nauchiaṅ
(young harlots) performed their usual work. Explaining further her devotional
intensity, he narrated how her eyes would get moistened at the mention of the
name of Sulṭānu’l Mashāʾikh (Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ), and her condition would
undergo a queer change. Narrating another incident, to which he was a wit-
ness, he said that while listening to the qawwāls reciting some of the couplets
of Amīr Khusraw on the death anniversary of Shāh Ghulām Sādāt, Bahjo’s con-
dition showed similar changes.34 An anecdote narrated by Shāh Abdul ʿAzīz
is reported by his grandson, Saiyyid Zahiru’d Dīn, in which a certain man who
died in Delhi appeared in the dream of another man and asked him to go to his
daughter and tell her to give something in charity for his redemption. This man
looked for this daughter and found out that she had become a prostitute. With
great difficulty, finally he reached her while she was having fun in a pond with
men. When she received her dead father’s message, in anger she threw some
water at this man. The father appeared in this man’s dream again and was told
that his daughter had turned into a bad woman. The father said, “Well this is
her doing (ʿamal); when she threw water, some drops went into the mouth of a
thirsty animal. On account of this, Allāh has bestowed great merits upon me.”35
The moral of the story brings out the merits of good.
34 Ibid, p. 122. Shāh Ghulām Sādāt Chishtī was one of the teachers of Ḥaẓrat Shāh Ghulām
ʿAli Dihlawī, see Shāh Ghulām ʿAli Dihlawī. Maqāmāt-i-Mazharī. (Urdu translation by
Muhammad Iqbal Mujaddidi). Lahore: Urdu Science Board (2001) p. 155, 515.
35 Maulawī Zahiru’d Dīn Saiyyid Aḥmad, 1348/1929. Ḥālāt-i ʿAzīzī (ḥiṣṣā awwal) Dehli: Maṭbaʿ
Mujtabāʾī, p. 7.
 Chapter 6

Women’s Presence in Sufi Silsilas

This chapter studies three aspects of women’s presence within the Sufi hier-
archical institutions organized and managed as silsilas: at the beginner’s level,
i.e., their initiation as disciples (murīda/murīd); women’s presence within the
Sufi hierarchy as khalīfas with authority to teach, instruct, and enroll disciples;
and their presence in the khānqāhs and Sufi lodges. Women’s initiation in the
Sufi ṭarīqa, similar to the issue of women’s testimony in legal affairs, has caused
dichotomy among the Muslim jurists and the scholars. In light of Ibn al-ʿArabi’s
(d. 638/1240) comment that there were women among the highest rank of the
Sufis, i.e., the forty abdāl, the general attitude of the Sufis restricting women’s
initiation appears perplexing and therefore calls for further investigation.1
The Sufi silsilas at their core were male institutions; their intrinsic organ-
isational pattern with the appointment of successors, conferment of walāya,
and a well-managed system of keeping a close watch on the activities of the
murīdīn, khalīfas, and in some cases on the income through unsolicited dona-
tions and grants ( futuḥ), all bespeak of a well-respected and superbly man-
aged system that can aptly be compared with the administrative systems of
kingdoms and sultanates. Similar to the ruling dynasties, each silsila followed
a ṭarīqa (spiritual path) created by a Shaikh and, hence, bore his name. Again,
falling within similar power dynamics that are common within these two
opposite male power domains, the Sufi silsila also go through division and
bifurcation; this divisiveness mostly remains couched in the name of spiritual
inspiration, though cases of severe conflicts are also known and are on record.
Similar to the political-military boundaries of empires, the Sufi’s jurisdiction
(wilāyat) was specific and well-marked. Thus, a man named ʿAbdullah Rūmī,
before setting out on a journey from Ajodhan to Multan, requested Shaikh
Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar to pray for his safe journey as the route was dan-
gerous. The Shaikh, as narrated in Fawa‌ʾid al-fuād of Ḥasan Sijzi, told him that
his jurisdiction ends at a certain spot where there was a pond and from there
onwards begins the territory of Shaikh Baha‌ʾu’d-Dīn Zakarīyya (az āṅjah tā ba
Multān dar ʿuhda-yi Shaikh Baha‌ʾu’d-Dīn ast).2 Another example that illustrates

1 Muhyiuddin Ibn al-ʿArabi. Al-futūhāt al-Makkiyya, vol. 2, Cairo, 1911, pp. 277–78, cited in
Buehler, Arthur E. 1998. Sufi Heirs of the Prophet: The Indian Naqshbandiyya and the Rise of
the Meditating Sufi Shaykh University of South Carolina Press, p. xxiv.
2 FF, Majlis 16th, 9 Jamādiu’l awwal,714/ 1314.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_008

Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 147

the spiritual jurisdictions of the Sufis comes from Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ and which is
discussed by Carl Ernst in the context of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ assign-
ing territories to his spiritual disciples.3 Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb, upon whom
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ conferred the spiritual domain of the Deccan, in turn
bestowed the wilāyat of Mongipattam and Khandesh upon Ḥaẓrat ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn
Ẓiyāʾ (d. 801/1398–1399), the grandson of Bībī ‘Āiʾshā, supposedly the daughter
of Shaikh Faridu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar, at the time of his birth.4 The anecdote
of Ḥaẓrat ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn Ẓiyāʾ is reminiscent of courtly tales in which the heir
apparent was appointed while still in the breast-feeding stage. Thus, even the
spiritual charisma, according to these anecdotes, had geographical frontiers,
and the Sufi masters wielded the power of appointing their deputies.
Indeed, the terminologies common in describing the power structure of
the above two institutions of worldly and spiritual authority—such as darbār
(court of a king), shāh (emperor), bādshāh (king), shāhinshah (king of kings),
gaddī (seat/throne), and gaddī-nishīnī (occupying the seat/throne), and sev-
eral other similar ones—are idioms of power and hierarchy and not of faqr
(poverty) and zuhd (renunciation). Both systems were governed by norma-
tive texts which codified laws (āʾīn) and etiquettes and manners (ādāb) which
closely guarded its members who were primarily males; women’s presence was
subject to the exigency of and approval by the male authority of the system.
Hence, naming of the silsilas after the names of their male founders came in
vogue. Thus, in the history of Sufism, there exists not one single silsila com-
memorating the name of a woman Sufi.

6.1 Women’s Initiation (Baiʿat)5

Taking or administering an oath of allegiance to a leader is an oral tradition

in most tribal societies. However, since the beginning of the new community
life in Madina, this oath of allegiance to the Prophet not only sanctified oath-
taking but also expanded its meanings to include not just allegiance to a leader
but to the new social order rooted in the concept of tawḥīd and taqwā. The
women’s oath of allegiance (baiʿat-i nisāʾ) at al-Aqaba, which has emerged as

3 Carl W. Ernst. 1992. Eternal Garden. Mysticism, History, and Politics at a South Asian Sufi
Center. New York: SUNY, pp. 235–36.
4 Rawnaq ʿAlī. 1326/1908. Rawẓatu’l-aqṭāb al-mʿarūf ba Mazhar-i Āṣafi. Aurangābād: Maṭbaʿ
Muʿīn-i Daccan, p. 229.
5 I have opted for the spellings baiʿat and not baiʿah, except in quotes, as baiʿat is a familiar
term in South Asia.
148 Chapter 6

a “recurrent theme in the biographies of female Companions,”6 has inspired

several shifting explanations, some even commenting that it reflects women’s
lower position as compared to that of men. Although different views are given
regarding the administering of the oath by the Prophet to women,7 the method
of administering the oath to women is based on two sources: the Qurʾān (60:12)
and the Ḥadīth. The Qurʾān says:

O Prophet! When believing women come to thee to take the oath of fealty
to thee, that they will not associate in worship any other thing whatever
with Allāh, that they will not steal, that they will not commit adultery (or
fornication), that they will not kill their children, that they will not utter
slander, intentionally forging falsehood, and that they will not disobey
thee in any just matter,—then do thou receive their fealty, and pray to
Allāh for the forgiveness (of their sins): for Allāh is Oft-Forgiving, Most
Merciful.8

The above verse (Sura al-Mumtahana, 60:12) refers to women’s oath of alle-
giance to the Prophet in Madina to become part of the Muslim community.9
As related by Ḥaẓrat ʿĀʾisha, the Prophet’s wife, when administering the oath
of allegiance, the Prophet did not touch the hands of women. Ibn Isḥāq also
endorses this when he writes,

The Prophet never used to take the women’s hands [when they gave their
oath of allegiance to him]; he did not touch a woman nor did one touch
him except one whom God had made lawful to him or was one of his
wives.10

6 Asma Sayeed. 2013. Women and the transmission of religious knowledge in Islam. New York:
Cambridge University Press, p. 56–57.
7 For details, see Asma Asfaruddin. 2010. ‘Early women exemplars and the construction of
gender space (re) defining feminine moral excellence.’ In Harem Histories: Envisioning
Places and Living Space. Edited by Marilyn Booth. Durham: Duke University Press,
pp. 23–48; also, Aisha Geissinger. 2015. Gender and Muslim Constructions of Exegetical
Authority: A Rereading of the Classical Genre of Qur’ān Commentary. Leiden: Brill.
8 The Holy Qurʾan, Text, Translation & Commentary by Yusuf Ali. Lahore: Shaikh Muhammad
Ashraf.
9 Barbara F Stowasser. 2005. ‘Women and Citizenship in the Qur’an.’ In Women and Islam:
Critical Concepts in Sociology. Edited by Haideh Moghissi. London [u. a.]: Routledge,
pp. 180–94.
10 Ashraf Ali Thanawi and Yusuf Talal DeLorenzo. 2010. A Sufi Study of Ḥadīth: Haqiqat al-
Tariqa min as Sunna al-Aniqa. London: Turath Publishing, p. 33; also, Quoted by Marion
Holmes Katz. 2002. Body of Text: The Emergence of the Sunnī Law of Ritual Purity. Albany:
Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 149

Women, though viewed as a hurdle in a male Sufi’s path, were still enrolled
as disciples. Ẓiyāʾu’d-Dīn Baranī (1285–1357), whose grave is next to that of Amīr
Khusraw (1253–1325), describes how people of all descriptions and vocations
came to Ghiyaspur, the hospice of the Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ (1238–
1325) in the suburbs of Delhi.11 Barani refers to the special arrangements that
were made to facilitate the travellers which included construction of raised
platforms (chabūtra) with straw canopies (chappar), water wells for drinking
and for ablution purposes, and even beddings for rest. Though Barani does
not directly refer to women travellers here, the word mardumān (people) in
this description indicates the inclusion of women. Women could come to his
khānqāh even after sunset for taking the oath of allegiance. The discourse of
the 20th Assembly held on 27 Jamādīu’l ākhir 708/1308 in Fawa‌ʾidu’l-fuʾād is a
significant one, because on that evening a woman presented herself to seek
an oath of allegiance (baiʿat).12 At this occasion, the Shaikh’s comments on
the numerous benefits that accrue from the virtues of women (dar samara-
yi ṣalāḥiyat-i ʿaurat bisyār) show not only that the Shaikh endorsed women’s
initiation but that he did not object to women taking the oath of allegiance
and initiated them. Ḥasan Sijzi, the scribe, does not tell us whether other
women were present at this Assembly or whether this woman arrived alone
or was accompanied by male members of her family. The Shaikh commented
that “dervishes who ask saintly women and saintly men to intercede on their
behalf, remember saintly women first because they are so rare (aṅkih nek
zanān gharīb bashand)”—a recognition that women have and can attain
saintly virtues. Then he added, “When a lion comes out [of the jungle], no one
asks whether it is male or female. Thus, what matters is that the children of
Adam, whether they be men or women, must be known for their devotion [to
Allāh] and piety.”13 One wonders how different would have been my narrative
if these words were put into practice and more women were initiated.
The practice of women becoming disciples (murīd) of the Chishtī sil-
sila continued during the time of the second Chishtī Shaikh of Delhi, i.e.,
Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī (d. 1356). Thus, a learned man
(dānish-mand), who was one of the disciples of the Shaikh (bandagān-i Ḥaẓrat
Makhdūm) and who taught Qurʾān to children, came from the village of Sahalī14

State University of New York Press, p. 247; also, see Ruth Roded. 1994. Women in Islamic
Biographical Collections: pp. 24–25.
11 Ẓiyā Barani 1862. Tārikh-i Fīrūz Shāhī. Calcutta: Asiatic Society of Bengal, p. 344.
12 FF, Majlis 20, 27 Jamādiu’l Ᾱkhir, 708/1308.
13 FF, Ibid.
14 Later, one of the families of these disciples from Sahalī became the founders of the
famous madrassa of Farangi Mahall of Lucknow.
150 Chapter 6

to the Thirty-Second Assembly of the Shaikh and informed him that most
people of his area, including women, were the Shaikh’s murīd (zanān ham-
paiwand). He also said that though men were mostly righteous (ṣāliḥ), women
were more righteous than men were (zanān-i āṅjā ṣāliḥ tar and az mardāṅ).
Hearing this, Ḥāmid Qalandar, the scribe of Khairu’l Majālis, the Shaikh’s
malfūz, submitted that this virtue (of women) as being of high spirituality was
due to the blessings of the Shaikh’s discipleship.15 Unfortunately, we have no
record to show either when or how many women were enrolled as disciples
in the Chishtī silsila under Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Din Maḥmūd. What we do know
is that a fairly large number of women were enrolled by the Shaikh. More
important is that the topic of women’s enrolment and their greater steadfast-
ness as virtuous and devout persons was brought up and noticed in an all-male
assembly. Neither the Shaikh nor anyone else present at the session objected
to women’s discipleship. On the contrary, women’s virtues of being righteous
(ṣāliḥ) were interpreted as an outcome of the blessings of their discipleship.
Later, in the narrative of the Fortieth Assembly of Khairu’l Majālis, which is
devoted to the initiation of an anonymous woman followed by a brief expo-
sition of baiʿat, Ḥāmid Qalandar records the rules of initiation for women,
which is the first detailed account of a woman being initiated as a disciple
of the Chishtī silsila.16 In this narrative, a woman could not present herself,
but through a man (ba-jihat-i kas rā) requested Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Din Maḥmūd
Chirāgh-i Dihlī to include her in his circle of murīds. This occasioned the expo-
sition of Sufi perception of administering the oath of allegiance to women,
even by proxy. The Shaikh asked someone to fetch a small earthen bowl filled
with water (kūzā-yi āb). He recited some verse of the Qurʾān over it, which
was not audible to those present there. He then dipped his finger of testimony
(angusht-i shāhādat) into this water and asked the man to take the bowl to
the woman who had requested initiation. He directed the man to convey
to the woman that “after giving my salutations to her (salām-i man), tell her
to immerse her index finger into this bowl of water, uttering these words,
‘I have now submitted myself to such person (man mutābiʿ falaṅ).’” Then she
should say her prayers, fast on the ayyām-i bīḍ, except during the days marked
with exemption (ayyām-i ʿuzr).17 She should also make a commitment of

15 KM, Majlis 32.

16 KM. Majlis 40; also, see section titled baiʿat nisā bā mashāʾikh and ṭarīqa baiʿat zananān bā
mashāʾikh in Ruknu᾽d-Dīn Dabīr Kāshānī. Shamā᾽ilu᾽l atqiyā᾽ [Virtues of the devout], ed.
Saiyyid ῾Aṭā᾽ Ḥusain. Hyderababd: Maṭbū῾ Ashraf Press, 1347/ 1929, pp. 48–49.
17 ayyām-i bīd, which means white days, are days when fasts are kept on the 13th, 14th, and
15th nights of each lunar month; ayyām-i ʿuzr refers to the days of menstruation when a
Muslim woman is exempted from keeping fasts during these days.
Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 151

being gracious (niyāz) to her servants and bondmaids (ghulām wa kanizak)

and not maltreat or hurt them (lat na kuni). She should also be polite to her
relatives and all others (bā ahl wa bā hama). Adding more to the subject, the
Shaikh further elucidated that there were two types of baiʿat: baiʿat-i Islam and
baiʿat-i irādat.18 While in the first case, conditions for women neophytes are
more than those for men; in the second one, these are the same for both men
and women. The Shaikh, apparently was referring to women’s pledge to the
Prophet at Madina because next he recited Sura al-Mumtahana and narrated
the Prophet’s Tradition of administering the oath to women and explained that
according to some, the Prophet used to cover his noble hand in his mantle from
Yemen before shaking hands with women. He then added that some Traditions
say that Amīru’l muʾminīn Ḥaẓrat ʿAlī (ra) used to do the handshake on behalf
of the Prophet.19 The Hadith or the narrator of the Tradition, however, was not
identified by Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Din Maḥmūd. The Fortieth Assembly of Khairu’l
Majālis is the first account of the ceremony of administering an oath of alle-
giance by a Shaikh to a woman. The ceremony was witnessed by all the male
members present, who also assisted in the process by fetching the water bowl
or by acting as a transmitter of the Shaikh’s message to the woman concerned.
This recorded incidence of an anonymous woman’s oath of allegiance is a pri-
mary signifier in the understanding of the later history of women’s initiation in
the Sufi silsilas of South Asia.
The conditions of initiation by Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Din Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i
Dihlī consist of three sets of behaviour incumbent and mandatory for a
woman novice: first, submission to the Shaikh; second, performance of the
basic religious obligations; and third, respect for human dignity with no dis-
tinctions of cadre and status. Thus, the path that a neophyte had to follow was
a path of humility and self-effacement and not of arrogance and snobbery.
Next, not only was it necessary for the woman to remain anonymous but it was
not considered essential to announce her name or unveil her identity either
during the oath-taking ceremony or later on. Similarly, the man who played
a key role in this episode of oath of allegiance is not only anonymous but his
relationship with the woman concerned is not considered important. Shaikh
Naṣīru’d-Din Maḥmūd did not even make it mandatory for the woman novice
to present herself before the Shaikh even at a later time. Once the essentials

18 Irādat, an Arabic word with the literal meaning of desire or inclination, in Sufi Adāb
(manuals) is a term for the intention to become a disciple of a Sufi Shaikh, the require-
ments of which are breaking all relations with other than God. See Nicholson, p. 199; also,
Hujwīrī, p. 245.
19 KM, Majlis 40.
152 Chapter 6

of the ceremony were over, the bond of discipleship was tied and the woman
joined the group of his atbāʿ through the Blessed connection of following the
Prophet. Finally, and most importantly, despite the obviously different method
of administering the oath to a woman disciple, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Din Maḥmūd
categorically declared that conditions for an oath of allegiance for a man and
a woman are equal (dar baiʾt irādat sharāʾit-i mardān wa zanān masāwī ast).
Contrary to Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Din Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī’s practice of ini-
tiating women into his silsila, his disciple and khalīfa, Khwāja Gīsū Darāz (d.
825/1422) did not encourage this practice, though he did initiate women as his
disciples and followed the same method as his Shaikh did.20 If someone wants
to be a soldier, he cannot evade the sword or bow and arrow, he argued, and
for one who desires to be a scholar, there is no escape for him from the pen,
inkpot, and paper. Thus, he emphasised that, similarly, “If a person wishes to
be a Sufi, he then has to hold the skirt of a Sufi (sufi kā daman pakŕnā paŕegā).”21
His khānqāh in Gulbarga, Deccan, a well-maintained and well-funded Sufi
establishment as compared to the austere khānqāh’s of his Chishtī mentor in
Delhi, was visited by large number of devotees and supplicants of all faiths
and social stature with gifts in cash and kind. The Shaikh was also of the view
that, compared to his time, initiation into the Sufi silsilas was not frequent in
earlier days. Also, if one became a follower of one particular Shaikh, he would
be free to receive instructions from the other Sufis as well.22 These rules, how-
ever, were mostly for the males. Khwāja Gīsū Darāz, unlike his Chishtī mentors,
was opposed to the initiation of women as disciples. Thus, among the various
other things that the Khwāja highly disapproved of, one was that of anyone
presenting a woman, a child, or a murīd of some other Sufi, before him for
the purpose of seeking initiation and guidance. As noted by ʿAbdu’l ʿAzīz b.
Sher Malik b. Muḥammad Wāʾiẓī in his Tarīkh-i Ḥabībī wa Tazkira-yi Murshidī
which he completed in 849/1445,23 that on such occasions, the Khwāja always
used to comment, “I have always regretted (nadāmat) instructing these three
types of people (sih ṭāʾifa). I have enough experience of them all.” In the end,
he argued, “there is nothing but displeasure (takaddur) and annoyance. I know

20 Armughān-i Sulṭānī, pp. 83–84.

21 Sharaḥ Jawāmiu’l-kilam, Majlis held on 28 Rajab, 802/March 25, 1400, p. 92.
22 Ibid, 7 Shabʿān, 802/ April 3, 1400, p. 114.
23 ʿAbdu’l ʿAzīz b. Sher Malik b. Muḥammad Wāʾiẓī, a scholar, was a disciple of Khwāja Gīsū
Darāz’s grandson and successor Yadu’llah Ḥusainī and completed the book while the
latter was still alive. For reference to his little-known life and scholarly works, see Nazir
Ahmad. 1973. “An old Persian Treatise of the Bahmani Period,” in Journal of the Indo-Iran
Society, 4 (4): pp. 11–34.
Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 153

it too well that this matter is not free of suffering loss and damage (khusrān).”24
He did not explain what caused this annoyance and displeasure and what
was this loss or damage. Gīsū Darāz’s malfūẓ, which his eldest son and khalīfa,
Saiyyid Akbar Ḥusainī, began to compile in 802 H, and whose contents were
approved by the Khwāja himself, provides further details of the causes of the
Khwāja’s displeasure and annoyance. Gīsū Darāz narrated an incident which
probably happened in Delhi, that once he began giving talqīn25 to an elderly,
educated woman, a disciple of his Shaikh, Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i
Dihlī. The woman, however, instead of concentrating on the Divine, began
enticing (῾ishqbāzī) the Shaikh. Recalling this incident, the Shaikh said, “The
Shaikhs were correct in saying that one should not instruct children and
women. Also, one should not accept his own wife as his disciple.” Giving rea-
sons for not accepting a wife as murīd, the Shaikh’s argument sounds more a
traditional hard-core misogynic argument than a pedagogical one. The Shaikh
said that the mischief (kharābī) in making one’s wife a murīd is that even if
she is obedient and subservient (muṭīʿ wa farmān-bardār) to her husband, she
cannot have the same respect and regard (nisbat) for her husband as a murīd
has with his pīr. He admitted that he, however, did initiate his wife, but later
felt abashed and regretted it (pashīmān). This experience proves (tajriba), he
argued further, that whatever the great Shaikhs (mashāʾikh-iʿuzzām) have man-
dated, it is not without wisdom (khālī az ḥikmat) and that whoever contradicts
(khilāf-warzī) these rules is humiliated.26 One is left wondering what his wife
did to him to cause him such great repentance and humiliation that he could
not forget it even in the closing years of his life, after a marital life of more than
forty years which produced a large number of children and grandchildren.
Did he not remember the Qurʾān which says that married couples are like gar-
ments to each other (Surah 2:187) and they, in addition to sexual relationships,
also protect each other as a vestment protects the body? Finding fault with his
parda-observing wife’s behaviour while depriving the audience of her side of
the story sounds like accusation which does not fall in line with the humility
and patience expected of a Sufi of Khwāja Gīsū Darāz’s stature.
Despite Khwāja Gīsū Darāz’s disapproval of initiating women, a large num-
ber of devotees, including women, visited his khānqāh each day and many of
them sought his allegiance. For the initiation of women, he followed strict
rules of segregation. If the woman was a veiled one (῾aurat mastūra), a curtain

24 Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī, p. 112.

25 Talqīn az-zikr, the teaching of the formula of recollection of Allāh, is a foundational train-
ing of a novice Sufi.
26 Sharaḥ Jawāmiu’l-kilam, Shʿabān 12, 802/April 8, 1400, p. 139.
154 Chapter 6

(chādar) was drawn between him and the woman. In most such cases, he
made sure that a maḥram of the woman was also present during the process.
All those who came to seek allegiance had to place some offerings before the
saint. The followers were instructed to bring dry fuel wood, rice and lentil, curd,
salt, and money to cover the cost of free meals (kandūrī).27 Probably, women
murīds were exempted from these offerings and payments, though it is not
mentioned. The only difference between the performance of baiʿat of a man
and a woman novice, says the author of Tārīkh-i Muḥammadi, was of shaking
hands and the use of scissors (miqrāẓ); both were not used for women and thus
women’s heads were not shaved. In addition, instead of placing a kulāh (hat), a
scarf or a handkerchief was placed on a woman novice’s head.28
Once an initiation has taken place, a life-long bond is established between
the Shaikh or pīr (meaning an old person and in this context the founder of
a Sufi silsila) and the murīd (disciple) and lasts beyond the physical demise
of the Shaikh. Once Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ recalled how his spiritual
mentor, Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i-Shakkar, while forgiving the Khwāja for
his involuntary utterances which had displeased the Shaikh, commented that
the Shaikh is the (bride) dresser of disciple (pīr mashshaṭa-yi murīd ast). In
other words, the Shaikh polishes, chisels, and fashions a new person out of
the person who originally came to him.29 Thus, initiation in a Sufi silsila in
simple terms is like enrolment in a learning institution which, in the case of
Sufism, is embodied in an individual, i.e., the Sufi. The Master guides the dis-
ciple to the Real Path (rāh-i-ḥaqq) which finally results in his salvation and
saves him from the punishment of hell fire (ʿaẓāb-i dozakh), as explained by
Khwāja Gīsū Darāz.30
Whereas initiation (bayʿa or baiʿat) of men in Sufi silsilas involved vari-
ous ceremonies and rituals, performed in the presence of other members of
the fraternity in the khānqāh of the Shaikh, the same was not practiced for
women. How the Prophet’s Tradition was practiced by the Sufis in South Asia
and perhaps elsewhere is discussed below. The discourses on baiʿat in the pri-
mary texts reflect the rules that were expounded by Shaikh ʿUmar Suhrawardī
(539/1145–632/1234) in his Arabic treatise on Sufi etiquettes ʿAwārifu’l-maʿārif
which continues to be widely read in South Asia. Even a cursory glance at
these rules shows that Suhrawardī was setting the manual for men and not for

27 Shāh Muḥammad ʿAli Sāmānī. 1427 H, Siyar-i Muḥammadī (Siyar-i Muḥammadīya tar-
jama al-maʿrūf, Tuḥfah al-Aḥmadī by Shāh Nazīr Aḥmad. Allahabad: Yūnānī Dawakhāna
Press, 1928), pp. 74–84.
28 Ibid, p. 33.
29 FF, Majlis 25, 9 Ramaẓān, 708 H.
30 Sharaḥ Jawāmiu’l-kilam, Majlis 27 Zīqad, 802/July 20, 1400, p. 463.
Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 155

women. The most important adāb (etiquette) for the novice is to submit to the
authority of the Shaikh, giving up all his choices in matters relating to his life.
For most women, this would not have been practical in view of the dynamics
of patriarchal society that curtails women’s decision-making status. Next, the
murshid and the murīd must hold their right hands. After the completion of
the ceremony in which both declare their new teacher-disciple relationship,
the disciple must kiss the right hand of the murshid and of the other saintly
persons present there.31 Obviously, this was not meant for women.
As initiation into Sufism was largely viewed as a male prerogative, therefore
all the Sufi manuals and discourses have a male audience in mind while expli-
cating the practice of initiation of a novice. Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd,
thus, laid down the first three basic rules for someone who seeks entry into
the Sufi way, i.e., he should get his sleeves shortened, get the hem of his shirt
shortened, and get his head shaved. The Shaikh argued that as under each hair
there lives a Satan, therefore, shaving of the head means destroying Satan’s
house (sar tarāshīda goyā khānā-yi shaitān kharāb kard).32 Obviously, these
rules were not for women.
There are instances showing male Sufi’s preparedness not only to enrol
women as their disciples but to adopt practices that were akin to women’s
ways of living. Shaikh ʿĪsā Jundu’llah Sindhi of Burhanpur (962/1555–1031/1622)
of the Shaṭṭārī silsila not only initiated a fairly good number of women as his
disciples, but he is the only one credited for introducing a novel method of rec-
ognising and honouring women.33 At the time of initiation, he used to give his
women disciples, instead of the kulha or the hat, a scarf made of four yards of
fabric. On this scarf, after Bismillah and the Kalimā-yi ṭayyaba, the name of the
woman disciple, her father’s name, and the date of initiation were inscribed
by Bābā Sattār (b. 983/1575), Shaikh ʿĪsā’s eldest son and successor. Shaikh
ʿĪsā respected and honoured women’s practice of veiling and did not define
it as a sign of their subordination or as a pretext for excluding them from the
Sufi circles.34
No one comes close to Shāh Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī (d. 1142/1729), one of
the last doyens of the Chishtī silsila in Delhi, in his earnest efforts to enrol

31 Suhrawardī, ʿUmar b. Muḥammad al-Maḥmūd b. ʿAlī al-Kāshānī, and Henry Wilberforce

Clarke. 1891. The ʿAwārifu’l-maʿārif, written in the thirteenth century. Calcutta: Government
of India Central Printing Office, pp. 160–164.
32 KM, Majlis 15.
33 For his biography, see Saiyyid Muḥammad Maṭiʿu’llah Rāshid Burhanpurī. 1957. Burhanpur
ke Sindhi Awliyāʾ. Haidrabad: Sindhi Adabi Board.
34 Ibid, pp. 99–100.
156 Chapter 6

women as disciples.35 Of his 123 letters addressed to his disciples, those written
to his khalīfa in the Deccan, Shāh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Aurangābādī (d. 1142/1730) and
which are aptly described by Nizami as the soul of all his letters,36 talk about
women’s initiation as part of Shāh Kālimu’llah’s call for the Truth (dʿāwat-i
ḥaqq).37 As these letters, in his words, were the rules of conduct (dastūru’l
ʿamal)38 for his disciples, his insistence on initiating women of all ages and
appearances—old or young, good looking or ugly—becomes a significant call
for women’s initiation. Under-age children should not be initiated, he warned,
because at times it might be fatal to them in view of certain spiritual medita-
tive exercises. To women the message of Truth (Ḥaqq), however, must reach
without any delay and they should be instructed (talqīn).39 In doing so, he
warned Aurangābādī, all precautions must be taken. Women should be treated
as muḥarrimāt (things prohibited)40 and therefore long hours of privacy with
young women must be avoided as this causes trouble for men (kih mūjib-i fitnā
mardum). He also reminded that touching an unrelated woman is unlawful
(mas-i ajnabiya ḥarām ast)41 and time spent with a woman in privacy causes
ill-fame and brings one close to Satan.42 Shāh Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī’s contin-
ual emphasis on women’s initiation, however, is not reflective of his soft atti-
tude towards women. Women, he said, should be instructed (῾aurat rā talqīn
bayad kard) but at the same time one should seek protection from their deceit
and avoid their trickery.43 Ḥaẓrat Mazhar Jān-i Jānāṅ followed almost a unique
method of transmitting his spiritual attention (tawjjuh) to his female disciples.
The wife of Ghulām Muṣṭafa Khan, one of his spiritual deputies who was also a
friend of Shāh Walīullah Dihlawī, was also a murīda of Ḥaẓrat Mazhar. Instead
of visiting him for instructions in his khānqāh, she used to sit daily at an
appointed time in her own house to seek attention in absentia of the Master.
A servant was sent to let the Shaikh know that she was in attendance. One day,
a certain man, her employee, arrived and informed the Master that she was in

35 For a biography of Shāh Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī, see Khaliq Ahmad Nizami, Ḥaẓrat Shāh
Kalīmu’llah Dihlawī. Dehli: Maktaba Burhān (1946), pp. 20–22.
36 Ibid, p. 38.
37 Letter No. 21 in Shāh Kalīmu’llah Dihlawī.1315/1897. Maktūbāt-i Kalīmī. Dehli: Maktabā
Mujtabai᾽, pp. 24–25.
38 Ibid, Letter No. 96, p. 73.
39 Ibid, Letter No. 35, p. 37; also, Letter No. 42, p. 41.
40 Ibid.
41 Ibid, Letter No. 21, p. 25.
42 Ibid, Letter No. 44, p. 43.
43 Ibid, Letter No. 42, p. 41; the story is narrated by Mirzā Aḥmad Akhtar in his Tazkira
Awliyāʾ-yi hind ( jild som). Dehli: Muir Press (n. d.), p. 119.
Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 157

attendance, but Ḥaẓrat Mazhar at once knew that the man was not telling the
truth and had come without his mistress’s permission.44
Shāh Walīullah Dihlawī (d. 1762), the eighteenth-century Sufi reformer
of Delhi, in his al Qawlu’l-jamīl (written in Arabic in 1733), discussed various
Sufi silsilas and the practices of initiation, emphasising that initiation was
a sunna of the Prophet and therefore was not wājib.45 Regarding women’s
baiʿat, he wrote that instead of touching the Shaikh’s hand, the woman should
hold one end of a piece of cloth and the Shaikh, the other end. Perhaps to
ward off several social evils that plagued the eighteenth-century South Asian
Muslim community, Shāh Walīullah also suggested that only verbal baiʿat was
permissible for women.46 This is not to suggest that he or his Sufi silsila, i.e.,
the Naqshbandī-Mujaddidī silsila, discouraged women’s initiation. Referring
to several disciples of his father, Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm (d. 1719), a Naqshbandī
Sufi, Shāh Walīullah, in a section titled mashāʾikh-i Naqshbandīyya ke ashghāl
(mystical exercises of the Naqshbandī Masters), narrates an incredible story
of one of his female disciples.47 Sharīfa Khatūn, daughter of one Muḥammad
Fāẓil, is recorded by Shāh Walīullah in Anfāsu’l ʿĀrifīn (Voices of the Gnostics).
She excelled even male disciples in holding her breath and repeating ism-i zāt
(reciting the name of the Essence, or Allāh) at least one thousand times or
even more.48 According to this anecdote, Sharīfa Khatūn was no ordinary dis-
ciple; despite her young age and her gender, she had absorbed the complete
reflection of her Shaikh.49
The stance of the Deoband School of scholars of Naqshbandī background in
the late nineteenth century on taṣawwuf and pīr-murīd relationship emerged
even more constricting in terms of women. The two founders of the Deoband
Madrasa (founded in 1866), Muftī Rashīd Aḥmad Gangohī (1829–1905) and
Maulānā Muḥammad Qāsim Nānotwī (1833–1877), excelled and outnumbered
other Muslim scholars in the issuance of fatāwā (sing. fatwa) and thus reached
a wider audience in propagating their interpretation of Islam and its jurispru-
dence. Mufti Rashīd Aḥmad Gangohī’s fatāwā issued in response to questions
asked by Muslims about women are few (the book does not recognize the

44 Shāh Ghulām ʿAlī Dihlawī. 1309/ 1892. Maqāmāt-i-Mazharī. Dihlī: Maṭbaʿ-i Mujtabāʾī, p. 57.
45 Shāh Walīullah Dihlawī, and Khurram ʿAlī. 1970. Shifāʾal-ʿalīl: tarjuma-yi Qawl al-jamīl.
Lahore: Islami Academy, p. 22.
46 Ibid, p. 41.
47 For the life of Shāh ῾Abdur Raḥīm, see Anfāsu’l ʿĀrifīn by his son, Shāh Walīullah Dihlawī
(Delhi: Maṭbaʿ Aḥmadī, 1315/1897).
48 Shifāʾal-ʿalīl, p. 93. This mystical exercise is performed by repeating the name of Allāh
while holding your breath.
49 See biographical notice on Sharīfa Khatūn in Part 2 of this book.
158 Chapter 6

gender of the person seeking the fatwa, but it is assumed that all were males),
but even these express a traditional patriarchal approach. For example, in
response to two separate questions on women’s baiʿat, Gangohī declared that
“in the opinion of the Sufi’s (ahl-i taṣawwuf), women’s baiʿat is not permissible,
albeit to instruct someone a shughl (inward engagement of a Sufi) or wazīfa
(silent recitation of Qurʾānic verses).”50 In support of his argument, he then
quoted at some length from a letter of his sixteenth-century ancestor and spiri-
tual mentor, ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī (d. 1537).51 While Muftī Rashīd Aḥmad
Gangohī rigidly rejected women’s initiation into the Sufi silsilas (though he did
initiate women by proxy and after great persuasion), he continued treating
women for their various ailments, including gynecological ailments, by giv-
ing medicines, particularly for easing labour pains.52 Paying tribute to his acu-
men in providing treatment to female patients with child-birthing difficulties,
Gangohī’s biographer, Meeruthī, records that in this process, Gangohī was not
assisted by a qāblā (midwife) nor did he examine the qārūra (urine test tube)
of the female patient. To avoid even a verbal contact with the female patient,
he did not let her speak about her ailment. What he did was to feel the pulse
of the patient, which meant touching their wrist with his fingers.53 Meeruthī
relates how on two occasions Gangohī, after initial hesitation, agreed to initi-
ate two women, one a commoner and the other royalty. In the first case, while
still a young man, a woman persisted in seeking baiʿat at his hands which he
initially refused. Finally, his spiritual mentor, Ḥāji ʿImādadullah Makkī (1817–
1899), took him to the woman’s house where, with a perspiring and blushing
face, he bowed to the request of the woman and granted her baiʿat.54 The sec-
ond is the case of the baiʿat of Nawab Sultan Jahan Begum, the ruler of the
Bhopal State. Before going for Ḥajj, Sultan Jahan Begum wanted to perform
baiʿat at the hands of Haji ʿImdādullah Muhājir Makkī. However, before this
could be done, he passed away. She then decided to approach his disciple,
Rashīd Aḥmad Gangohī, by sending him at least two letters. Gangohī agreed in

50 Maulānā Rashīd Aḥmad Gangohī. Fatāwā-yi-Rashīdiyya (Kamīl) Fiqh Ḥanafī kā Anmol

Khazīnāh. Karachi: Dāru’l Ishāʿat, n. d., p. 72, 79.
51 AA, pp. 215–17; Digby, Simon. 1975. ʿAbd al-Quddus Gangohi (1456–1537): The personality
and attitude of a medieval Indian Sufi,’ in Khaliq Ahmad Nizami (Edited). Medieval India:
A Miscellany. (pp. 1–66). London: Asia Publishing House.
52 Muḥammad ῾Āshiq Ilāhī Meeruthī. 1344/1925. Tazkirātur Rashīd-ḥiṣṣā awwal. Sadhora:
Bilal Steam, p. 65.
53 Ibid, p. 66; Meeruthī, in another book, explains that it is permissible for a male physician
to feel the pulse of a female patient according to Sharīʿā. See Tuḥfā-yi khwatīn. Karachi:
Maktaba Ma῾ārif al-Qurʾān (2009), p. 800.
54 Tazkirātur Rashīd-ḥiṣṣā awwal, pp. 53–54; the letters were delivered by the Qāzī of the
Bhopal State.
Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 159

1323/1905, a few months before his own demise, to the Begum’s written request
and performed the baiʿat by proxy.55
Another Deobandi scholar, Maulānā Ashraf ʿAlī Thanāwī (1864–1943)
thought differently. Not only in his magnum opus work, the Bihishti Zewar
(The Heavenly Ornament),56 did he encourage little Muslim girls “to become a
maulawī—that is, a scholar of Arabic,” but he also enumerated several benefits
for women if they chose to become a murīd, as it is only through the baraka
of a pīr that one follows the right path. However, an unmarried girl should
take the oath with the permission of her parents and a married woman with
the permission of her husband. He also warns that at the time of initiation
ceremony, she must observe parda with the pīr and should never put her hand
into that of the pīr. In case one gets to know that the pīr is not the right one, she
must break her vow of allegiance immediately.57

6.2 Arguments against Women’s Presence in the Sufi Silsilas

A stronger trend with contradictory arguments, creating an ambivalence about

women’s position in Sufism, emerged with the spread and wider acceptance of
reformist scholars, some of whom were informed by Naqshbandī Sufism. The
Naqshbandis in South Asia, as elsewhere, have produced several voluminous
works and small tracts on the Way of Sufi Masters. With the beginning of the
twentieth century, a more conservative and vigorous public discourse regarding
women’s status within the context of their initiation into Sufi silsilas emerged.
Surprisingly, these scholars, fed by Mujaddid Alf-i Sānī’s tirade against women,
in the heat of their arguments and led by their passion to keep women under
restrictions, forgot about the charismatic Sufi woman, Ḥaẓrat Bībī Ṣāḥiba
also known as Bībī Kalān (d. 1803) and a descendant of Mujaddid Alf-i Sānī,
being the niece of Ḥaẓrat Ṣafīu’llah Qayyūm-i Jahan (1746–1798). Held along
the controversial issue of women’s segregation and observance of parda, these
debates, while dichotomic in nature, open a new window to view male Sufi’s
perceptions of women. One such example is the Miʿyār-us sulūk (the standard
of following the mystical path), published in 1927, of Muḥammad Ḥidāyat ʿAlī
Jaipurī (d. 1951), a Naqshbandī-Mujaddidi reformist-scholar and an education-
ist. This book, while presenting various aspects of the Naqshbandī-Mujaddidī
silsila of the Sufis, was mainly written in the words of its author, Jaipurī, to dispel

55 Tazkirātur Rashīd-ḥiṣṣā dom, pp. 103–4.

56 Maulānā Ashraf ʿAlī Thanāwī. 1905. Bihishtī Zewar. Lahore: Shaikh Ghulam Ali and Sons.
57 Ibid.
160 Chapter 6

the “misleading views” of those Sufis who have not only strayed but led others
to fall into the pit of depravity (chāh-i gumrāhī). Among such acts of innova-
tion (bidʿat) is the initiation of women without honouring parda rules. These
misguided persons, who claim to be the leaders (rāhnuma), do this under the
pretext of being the fathers of their women disciples, warns the author. Jaipurī
rejects and condemns this misguided behaviour of such fraudulent pīrs, com-
menting that parda observance for women is a Divine command ( farẓ). To
illustrate his statement, Jaipurī cites the example of the Prophet who took
women’s oath of allegiance orally at the time of the conquest of Makkah.58 Pīrs
who do not observe parda rules in their contacts with their women disciples
are in a situation of extreme risk and dread (nihāyat khaṭreh aur andeshey),
warns Jaipurī. To strengthen his warning, he quotes a Ḥadīth of the Prophet
without identifying its source, in which the Prophet, on seeing the mother
of the Believers, Ḥaẓrat ʿĀʾisha, sitting alone with her father, Ḥaẓrat Abū Bakr
Ṣiddīq, is said to have commented, “O Abū Bakr! Satan is not far away. Do not
sit alone even with a daughter; on the contrary have a third person with you.”59
Thus, setting the prelude to his next section, baiʿat karne aur tawajjuh dene
ke mutaʿalliq (Concerning taking the oath of allegiance and spiritual atten-
tion), Jaipurī explains the Naqshbandī-Mujaddidī stance on the question of
women’s initiation into the Sufi silsila at the hands of male Sufis. Following are
some of the major principles that Jaipurī listed for initiating women:60
1. At the time of initiation, women should remain hidden away (in parda)
and not be visible.
2. Women should repeat the same phrases as men do, the only difference
being that neither a woman’s hand will be held (by the pīr) nor the ism-i
zāt (the word Allāh) will be inscribed with the index finger (angusht-i
shāhadat) on their chest (qalb). Ism-i zāt will be inscribed only with the
power of imagination on the heart of a woman.
3. A woman’s verbal pledge will be sufficient.
4. If a woman’s blood relation (maḥram) is also a member of the silsila, he,
then, should be made to sit between the pīr and the woman; in case he is
not a member, the pīr should make the woman sit as far away as possible
so that the words of talqīn (instructions) are not audible to her.
5. It is not permissible for an unrelated (nā-maḥram) woman to look at
her pīr.

58 Shāh Muḥammad Hidāyat ʿAlī Jaipurī. 1926. Mi‘yārus sulūk wa dāfi‘ al-auhām wal-shakūk.
Kanpur: Maṭbaʿ-yi intizāmī, pp. 3–4.
59 Ibid, p. 164.
60 Ibid, pp. 167–168.
Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 161

6. It is permissible to initiate a menstruating woman and a woman under-

going postpartum as the intent of initiation is doing repentance (tawba)
and purification of the soul (tazkiyā-yi nafs).
7. Finally, assuming that a disciple is normally a man, Jaipurī instructs a
murid “to keep his women veiled” from the pīr.61
Under the section bayān namāz tahajjud (account of midnight prayers), Jaipurī
addresses men only to offer midnight obligatory prayers and makes another
fallacious statement that women are weak in physique and intellect (ẓaʿīf ul-
jussa aur ẓaʿīf ul-ʿaql) but are akin to manual workers, such as sweepers and
washer men in doing their household chores, such as cooking and grinding
corn. Displaying his contempt for women and their household work, he argues
that if lowly persons such as women can get up far before dawn to do house-
hold chores for the happiness of their children and husbands, why can men
not rise and offer the tahajjud prayers. Here, Jaipurī addresses not only men,
but the crux of his argument is that obligatory prayers, such as tahajjud, are
for men only.62 This statement, again, is highly erroneous and contradicts the
spirit of the Qurʾān which does not classify acts of ʿibādat in gendered terms.
It is worth remembering that Jaipurī’s book came out at a time when South
Asian Muslim male scholars passionately and vigorously advocated issues of
women’s seclusion, including restrictions on their mobility. Aḥmad Raza Khan
Fāzil Barelwī (1856–1921), also addressed as Aʿlā-ḥaẓrat (His most exalted maj-
esty) by his followers spread over the whole of South Asia and whose writings
are believed to carry charismatic powers, wrote a treatise which was published
around 1920. This treatise, Jumal al-nūr fī nahī al-nisāʾ min ziyārat al-qubūr:
al-mʿarūf, Mazārāt par ʿaurtoṅ kī ḥāẓirī (women’s shrine visitation) was written
as an answer to a query by one Maulawī Ḥakīm ʿAbdur Raḥīm from Gujarat,
India, in 1339/1920 regarding permissibility of women’s shrine visitation.63
Advocating strict observance of women’s segregation and women’s subservi-
ence to the authority of their husbands, Aḥmad Raẓa Khan at the end of this
forty-eight-page tract rejects the possibility of women holding any position
in the hierarchy of Sufi silsilas. He strongly argued that “a woman cannot be
dāʿī- ilal-Allāh (one who calls people towards Allāh), albeit, there is no harm
if she conveys the teachings of her murshid (spiritual master).” To support his
argument, he then quotes a passage in Arabic with translation in Urdu from a
sixteenth-century Egyptian scholar, ʿAbd al-Wahāb al-Shaʿranī’s work Al-Mīzān

61 Ibid, p. 171.
62 Ibid, p. 176.
63 Aḥmad Raza Khan Fāẓil Barelwī. Jumal al-nūr fī nahī al-nisāʾ min ziyārat al-qubūr:
al-mʿarūf, mazārāt par ʿaurtoṅ kī ḥāẓirī. Lahore: Shabbir Brothers (n. d.).
162 Chapter 6

al-kubrā al-Shaʿrānīyah,64 who said that only a man, and not a woman, can call
people towards Allāh. He also said that there is no evidence in history that a
woman has ever had the position of training the disciples because women are
deficient in status. Indeed, a woman’s uttermost quality is only that she should
be ʿābida (devout and pious) and zāhida (abstinent) like Rābiʿa al ʿAdawiyya.
Thus, Aḥmad Raẓa Khan Fāẓil Barelwī rejects that women can be Sufi Masters
(murshid).65
The message of Aḥmad Raẓa Khan Fāẓil Barelwī stands inscribed in the
heart of his followers who surge like waves of the ocean around the world,
thereby closing the gates to women.

6.3 Women as Sufis (Awliyāʾ Allāh)

It is important to note that discipleship of a Sufi is different from holding a

position in the hierarchy of a Sufi silsila. Discipleship does not entail any pub-
lic acknowledgement or a public signifier. Rather, it results in the adoption
or interiorisation of a mode of pious living which gradually results in renun-
ciation of all worldly attractions, including self-projection. In contradiction to
this, holding positions within a Sufi silsila or being a member of a Sufi hierar-
chy and association with a Sufi hospice and khānqāh is a public expression of
piety and devoutness. Thus, adherence and submission to piety is the essence
of the pious way of life which is a definition of taṣawwuf, known to us by its
more readily understood nomenclature, i.e., Sufism.
Recognition, identification, and acceptance of women as Sufis, however,
does not come easily to men in general and to male Sufis in particular, even
when they are guided, mentored, and counselled by women Sufis. Stories of
Sufis who lived outside India and had several encounters with women were
frequently told in India. In these stories, the names of highly revered male Sufis
appear. Thus, in the Tazkiratu’l Awliyāʾ of Farīdu’d-Dīn ʿAṭṭār (d. 617/1220) of
Nishapur, women who counselled wandering or travelling Sufis remain anony-
mous, and are mostly described as old, ugly, and dishevelled, as it is gener-
ally assumed that young and comely looking women excite passions in men of
all ages and of all professions as women come from a lower soul.66 Similarly,

64 ʿAbd al-Wahhab al-Shaʿranī (1493–1565) an Egyptian Shafiʿī scholar and mystic, founder of
an Egyptian silsila of Sufism which gradually declined after Shaʿranī’s death, although it
remained active until the 19th century.
65 Jumal al-nūr fī nahī al-nisāʾ pp. 47–48.
66 Rkia Cornell. 2007. “‘Soul of a Woman was Created Bow’: Woman as the Lower Soul
(Nafs) in Islam,” in Grad D. Gort, Henry Jansen, & Hendrik M. Vroom (Editors). The World
Religions and Evil. Religious and philosophical Perspectives. NY: Rodopi, pp. 257–280.
Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 163

Bāyazīd Basṭāmī (d. 874),67 one of the Sufis who was highly intoxicated with
Divine love, and according to some was influenced in his mystical concept of
fanā of Abū ʿAlī Sindi (from lower Sindh),68 acknowledged an old woman as
his murshid who taught him the real lesson of eliminating one’s ego but left
her anonymous. Neither Basṭāmī nor ʿAṭṭār, nor any other source, mentions
the name of this mentor of such a great Sufi who after his dialogue with the
woman was so ashamed of himself that he felt that he had gone “from the high-
est high to the lowest low.”69 In another anecdote, Sahl al-Tustarī (d. 283/896),
a Sufi-scholar who wrote a commentary of the Qurʾān70 and who taught Ḥallāj
(d. 309/922), in turn learned the basics of Sufism from an anonymous old,
dishevelled-looking woman in two very unusual circumstances. First, he was
embarrassed by this woman who rejected some money that he tried to give her
in charity, but she in turn lifted her arm up and opened her fist to show what
her palm was holding. She told him, “You take out money from your pocket;
I get it from the Invisible.” Next, arriving at the Kaʿba, he encountered her again.
Seeing his surprise at beholding the Kaʿba circumambulating her, instead of
her going around the House of Allāh, the old unnamed woman said, “Going
around the Kaʿba is required for one who plans his journeys to the Kaʿba; the
Kaʿba circumambulates the one who arrives here in a state of agitation.”71
Discourse on male-female dichotomy surprisingly appears as an oft-repeated
theme of the mystical sessions of the early Chishtīs. Khwāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn
Chirāgh-i Dihlī believed that women have the potential to be friends of God,
but not in the context of ordinary women. He even declared and followed
equal rules for initiating women in his silsila. In his Eleventh Assembly, Shaikh
Naṣīru’d-Dīn began a discourse on, among other matters, the karāmāt-i Awliyāʾ
(charisma of the saints). Referring to Surah al-ʿImrān 3:37, the Shaikh narrated
the story of Maryam pārsā (Maryam the chaste) and commented that she
received food from Allāh because she was a friend of God (Maryam walīyya
būd).72 However, public expression of ordinary women’s piety was contested.
Thus, for quantifying the spirituality of ordinary women, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn

67 For a biographical notice, see Faridu’d-Dīn ʿAṭṭār. 1997. Tazkiratʾul-awliyāʾ (Urdu transla-
tion). Lahore: al-Farūq Book Foundation.
68 Reynolds A. Nicholson. 1914. The Mystics of Islam. Sacramento Calif: Mautice Press
(reprint, 2006), p. 12.
69 Faridu’d-Dīn ʿAṭṭār. 1997. Tazkiratu’l-awliyāʾ (Urdu translation), p. 106; Farīd al-Dīn ʿAṭṭār
and Paul E. Losensky. 2009. Farid ad-Din ʿAttār’s Memorial of God’s Friends: Lives and
Sayings of Sufis. New York: Paulist Press, p. 208.
70 Sahl ibn ʿAbd Allāh Tustarī, Annabel Keeler, and Ali Keeler. 2011. Tafsīr al-Tustarī.
Louisville, KY: Fons Vitae.
71 Faridu’d-Dīn ʿAṭṭār. 1997. Tazkiratu’l-awliyāʾ (Urdu translation). Lahore: al-Farūq Book
Foundation, p. 170.
72 KM, Majlis 11.
164 Chapter 6

applied a different scale. In one of his discourse sessions, he eloquently distin-

guished between the merits of prayers offered by a widowed woman and those
offered by a male seeker for Divine Grace. Addressing Maulānā Hissāmu᾽d-Dīn
Multāni (671/1272–753/1352),73 Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn went to the extent of dis-
tinguishing between prayers offered by a woman and by a man to seek Allāh’s
proximity. He said if a person fasts each day and prays each night (agar kasi roz
ṣāʾim bāshad wa shab qāʾim), there is nothing great in it, because any widow (īṅ
miqdār har bewa zan) can do this much prayer and fasting. Thus, what makes a
person attain proximity to the Divine is not prayer and fasting; the concentra-
tion (mashgūlī) that the men of Allāh (bandagān-i khuda) need to seek Allāh’s
proximity is of a different order ( juz īṅ mashghūli ast).74 The Shaikh, who was
a scholar of Islamic jurisprudence ( fiqh) and had “intimate knowledge of the
Qurʾān,”75 most probably was not excluding women from bandagān-i khudā.
Here, thus, the reference is to Sufi men who act as mentors for other men.
Interestingly, Shaikh Naṣīru’d Dīn’s successor, Khwāja Gīsū Darāz (d. 825/
1422), propagated a disparaging perception of women. Instead of selecting
only a discourse session, he is the first of the Chishtīs to choose the medium of
communication through writing letters to friends and disciples. Thus, in one
such letter, addressed to Shaikhzāda Khwāja Ṣadru’d-Dīn Khwand Mīr76 and
his brothers, demeaning women’s spirituality and submission to the Divine, he
wrote that prayers (namāz guzārdan), keeping fasts (rozā dāshtan), and doing
munificent acts and good deeds (ḥasanāt wa mabarrāt) and other similar acts
can be performed by a widow; remembrance of the seekers of the Divine is
something different (mashghūlī ṭālibān-i khudā kār-i alā-ḥida bāshad).77 In the
closing sentences of the same letter, referring to the mother of Khwand Mīr
and sending prayers (duʿāʾ) for her, and perhaps indirectly appreciating her
virtuous acts, he further expressed his bias against women. He wrote that “a
woman who performs manly deeds (ʿaurat kih kār-i mardaṅ) is indeed a man
in the form of a woman (o mard ast bar ṣūrat-i ʿaurat); if a man acts as a woman

73 Maulānā Hissāmu᾽d-Dīn Multāni was one of the khalīfas of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ
who deputed him to Gujarat where the Maulānā passed away at Patan. See AA, pp. 87–89.
74 KM, Majlis 17.
75 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami in his introduction to Khair-u’l-majālis: Conversations of Shaikh
Nasir-u’d-din Chiragh of Delhi [ob. 1356] compiled by Hamid Qalandar, p. 9, 10.
76 Shaikh Ṣadru’d-Dīn Khwand Mīr belonged to the family of scholars. His grandfather
and father held the office of Shaikhu’l Islam of Irichpur. Ṣadru’d-Dīn became a disciple
of Khwāja Gīsū Darāz in 810 and later was appointed as one of his khalīfas. See Siyar-i,
Muḥammadī, pp. 133–34.
77 Letter no. 22 (undated) to Shaikhzāda Khwand Mīr in Khwāja Ṣadru’d-Dīn Abu’l Fath
Saiyyid Muḥammad Gīsū Darāz Chishtī and Saiyyid ʿAta‌ʾ Ḥussain (Edited) Maktūbāt
Imāmu’l ʿĀrifīn Saiyyid Muḥammad Gīsū Darāz. Hyderabad: Barqī Press. 1362 (1943), p. 48.
Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 165

does, that man is sensual (hawa parast), he is a woman in the form of a man,
indeed worse than her (balki bad-tar az āṅ).”78 These views were so deeply and
strongly embedded in the Shaikh’s psyche that once again, in another letter, he
repeated the same ideas in the same words.79

6.4 Women as Khalīfas

The question of women’s position as spiritual deputies or successors (khalīfas)

of male Sufi Shaikhs is highly debated, causing serious rifts among Sufi Shaikhs
and religious scholars. This rift is rooted in the concept of authority and power.
Historically, the image of a khalīfa is of a male Sufi, wielding spiritual author-
ity with a potential to influence the temporal authority of the rulers. A Sufi
khalīfa, thus, plays a dual role and function. Spiritual succession is an issue
of Sufism, with its hierarchical power structure created and nourished by the
rules of Sufi silsilas. In the early Sufi sources of South Asia, when the issue of
the legitimacy of pious women’s spiritual succession first surfaced, it was dis-
cussed not as an issue of khilāfat only.80 It was jointly presented as a double
issue of khilāfat wa sajjāda-yi Mashāiʾkh. Sajjāda is a place where the forehead
touches the ground in offering prayers or in thanksgiving. This place could be a
prayer rug, a mosque, a house, or any other appropriate location. In South Asia,
sajjāda, when used to denote earthly obedience and power, is also called gaddi
(literally meaning a throne or seat of authority), and thus, sajjāda-nishīn are
also referred to as gaddī-nishīn.81 The following section analyses this issue in
light of Sufi discourses. This significant issue of spiritual succession of women
Sufis, however, remains relatively underreported in contemporary hagiograph-
ical texts. It is also ignored by modern scholars, who have interpreted it in the
context of male contestants only.82

78 Ibid, p. 48.
79 Ibid, letter no. 65 to Amīr Chanda, p. 123.
80 Khilāfat, an Arabic word, is used both as a noun and as a verb. It represents the function
of the power of the khalīfa and is also used for the office of khalīfa.
81 Rifts and litigations over sajjāda and gaddī-nishīnī, mainly among male contestants,
has a prolonged history, often ugly. The British colonialists of India codified laws about
the handling of the large shrine endowments. Some of these laws are based on oral
traditions. See W.H. Macnaghten and William Sloan. 1882. Principles and precedents of
Moohummudan law, relative to the doctrine of inheritance, contracts and miscellaneous
subjects. Madras: Higginbotham. (First published in 1825, Calcutta).
82 See for instance, Simon Digby. 2003. “The Sufi Shaikh as A Source of Authority in
Medieval India.” In India’s Islamic Traditions 711–1750. Edited by Richard M. Eaton, Oxford
University Press, Delhi, 2003, pp. 237–41; Tanvir Anjum, ‘Sons of Bread and Sons of Soul’
166 Chapter 6

In general, male opinion remained hostile to the idea of women holding the
position of a spiritual successor. However, it did not begin on a note of rejec-
tion. Surprisingly, and in contradiction to the later development, the histori-
cal growth of the institution of spiritual succession began in a positive light
with the example of Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl, the daughter of Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn
Chishtī Ajmeri (d. 633/1236) and his wife, a daughter of a local Hindu chieftain
of Rajput ancestry. Jawāhir-i Farīdī, a hagiographical tazkira of Sufi biographies
completed in 1623, says that Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl was given the cloak of Sufi Shaikh
on 11 Rabiʿu’l ākhir 599, after ʿisha‌ʾ prayers by her father, Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn
Chishtī Ajmeri.83 Later, Risāla Siyaru’l Aqṭāb (1646), referring to the charisma
(karāmat) of Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl, also confirmed that among his at least eigh-
teen spiritual successors, Khwāja Ajmeri also included the name of Bībī Ḥāfiz
Jamāl.84
The practice of recognising women as spiritual deputies, however, soon lost
approval. It has resurfaced, with some limitations, in the recent past. Before
the thirteenth century could come to its end, Muslim women of South Asia
were disqualified to hold the office of a spiritual deputy because they were
women. The first Sufi Master to negate this was none other than one of the
disciples of Khwāja Ajmeri, Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar (1175–1265).
When the question of naming Bībī Sharīfa, his exceptionally worthy second
daughter who had inherent attributes of a friend of Allāh, as his successor was
considered, the Shaikh commented,

Had it been permitted to give the authorization for succession [of the Sufi
Shaikh] and the permission to sit on the rug of prayer [seat of the Shaikh]
to a woman, I would have given it to Bībī Sharīfa (agar ‘aurat rā khilāfat
wa sajjāda-yi Mashāiʾkh dādan rawā būd man Bībī Sharīfa rā mī-dādam).85

These words of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn, though few in number, carried immeasur-

able weight in tilting the scale in favour of men. Since the thirteenth century,
these words have acquired the status of a sacred dictum and have served as a
preamble to misogynist rationalisation of depriving women of roles as spiri-
tual deputies (sajjāda-nishin). The above brief reference of Kirmānī in Siyaru’l
Awliyāʾ, like most other accounts about women Sufis, is abruptly cut short.

Lineal and Spiritual Descendants of Baba Farid and the Issue of Succession.’ In Sufism in
Punjab: mystics, literature and shrines. Edited by Surinder Singh and Ishwar Dayal Gaur.
2009. Delhi: Aakar Books, 2009, pp. 63–79.
83 Fihrist Kitab Jawāhir-i Farīdī, p. 162.
84 Risālā Siyaru’l Aqṭāb, p. 127.
85 SA p. 191.
Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 167

We do not know when and by whom this suggestion was first made. Does it
reflect a process of inner thoughts of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn expressing his inabil-
ity, under the weight of antiwomen traditions, to take what he thought was
the best course of action? Or was this rejection based on his understanding
of the Qurʾān? The use of the word rawā could be a significant key for fur-
ther exploration of the root of his concerns. Rawā ordinarily is not a term of
reference for the laws derived from the Qurʾān and Ḥadīth. It is associated
more with the practices that get further approval by the process of repetition.
Further, the words, as quoted by Kirmānī, do not convey a determined, well-
considered stand of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn. The presence of the word agar (if)
in this reference, indicates further his willingness rather than his rejection. In
addition to the above, it appears as if the question of Bībī Sharīfa’s succes-
sion was already an issue discussed at the Ajodhan Jamāʿat-khāna. Probably
Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn’s statement was in response to this discussion. If this were
the case, it means that a woman’s spiritual succession was discussed among
Sufi men with faith in taṣawwuf. This possibility encourages me to consider
Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn’s disapproval as his effort to alleviate a rift among his dis-
ciples. The last point carries more weight in view of the activities of Shaikh
Farīdu’d-Dīn’s son, who was desperate to get hold of the Jamāʿat-khāna and
turn it into a source of income. We can infer from Kirmānī that the statement
was most probably made during the closing days of the Shaikh when he was
almost in a state of being besieged by his world-wise sons. It is significant to
note here that Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn passed away without appointing any of his
sons either as his khalīfa or gaddī-nishīn. His statement about Bībī Sharīfa,
however, continues to resonate as a declaration against women’s spiritual
succession.
As exceptions are part of human experiences, there are occasional and
rare incidents of women receiving khilāfa recorded in Sufi texts. One such
earlier example is the case of the succession of Khwāja Gīsū Darāz in Siyar-i
Muḥammadī, which was later included in Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī. Khwaja Gīsū Darāz
once narrated that at the passing away of his mentor, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn
Chirāgh-i Dihlī, his wilāyat was divided among four of his disciples, namely,
Khwaja Gīsū Darāz, a potter (kulāl), a chest carver (ṣandūq tarāsh), and a
woman. Subsequent to the demise of each of the last three mentioned, their
share was also given from “that side,” i.e., ʿālam-i bālā (the world above—
Heaven) to the Khwāja.86 The anecdote, not found in any other contemporary
Sufi text, is a surprising one in view of Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn’s estimation of what

86 Siyar-i Muḥammadī, p. 21; Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī, p. 22; Armughān-i Sulṭānī al-maʿrūf sair-i
Gulbarga, p. 42.
168 Chapter 6

he argued was women’s inherent nature—lack of intelligence and their subse-

quent deficiency in their understanding of the faith.
Saiyyid Muḥammad Ashraf Jahāngīr Simnānī (d. 1437),87 a well-read and
widely travelled Sufi émigré from Central Asia, having links with several Sufi
traditions and a firm believer in hamā ast (all is He), arrived in India and finally
settled in Kichauccha Sharīf (in the District of Amedakar, Uttar Pradesh, India).
A contemporary of Khwāja Gīsū Darāz, whom he also visited and spent consid-
erable time at his khānqah in Gulbarga, Simnānī reflects Gīsū Darāz’s stringent
disapproval of women’s role as Sufi guides. In his malfūzāt, compiled by his
disciple, Nizāmu’d-Dīn Yamanī, he acknowledges that the amount (miqdār) of
knowledge and Truths (ḥaqāʾīq wa maʿārif ) he gained from Khwāja Gīsū Darāz
was far greater than one could get from any other Shaikh.88 These malfūzāt,
among various other themes, also discuss pir-murid relationship and the sta-
tus that women should or should not hold within the Sufi hierarchy. Simnānī
extolled women such as Rābiʿa al-Basri and Fāṭima, wife of Sultan Aḥmad
b. Khiẓrawayah (d. 240/854–855) for their virtues and striving in the path of
Allāh ( faẓāʿil wa mujāhidāt). He even acknowledged that some women had
also attained the status of abdāls. Despite all these acknowledgements and
references, Simnānī remained fixed in his argument that whatever high sta-
tus women might have had and that to some even Allāh bestowed such great
spiritual knowledge that even men of the path of Sufism needed their help
(muḥtāj), and some even excelled men (manzilat īshāṅ ziyadah az bʿāẓ rijāl
ast), still none of them could train disciples (tarbiyat-i muridān) because of
the limitations of veiling and concealment. As this veiling and concealment
prohibits women from participating in public functions, particularly in their
role as leaders, therefore, for the same reason women were not bestowed the
status of prophethood (nabūwat), argued Simnānī.89 Simnānī’s arguments
against women’s status in Sufi hierarchy might appear incredible to a modern
audience, but these views represent the most extensively held discourse about
women which continues even today.
The most eloquent disavowal of women as Sufis, however, came from ʿAlāʾu’d-
Dīn ʿAlī bin ʿAbdu’l-Malik Ḥusāmu’d-Dīn al-Muṭṭaqī al-Hindī (885/1480–
975/1567) a scholar born in Burhanpur and who migrated to Makkah and died

87 For his life account, see AA, pp. 60–61; also, Azkār-i Abrār, p. 145; Rizvi, History of Sufism,
Vol. 1, pp. 259–60, 266–70.
88 Ashraf Jahāngīr Simnānī. 1499/1999. Laṭāʾif-i Ashrafī fī bayān-i ṭawā’if-i Ṣūfī. (vol. 1).
Karachi: Ḥalqa-yi Ashrafiya, p. 367.
89 Ibid, pp. 330–31.
Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 169

there.90 Shaikh ʿAlī Muṭṭaqī was a Sufi and a scholar of Ḥadīth, with disciples
in the Arab world and in India. An ascetic in its true sense, Shaikh ʿAlī Muṭṭaqī
earned his living by copying rare manuscripts. He also wrote more than one
hundred books. His Kanzu’l ʿUmmāl, an encyclopaedia of Ḥadīth, is still used as
a reference source. Of these hundred books, one is al-unwān fi sulūkuʾn-niswān
(a preface to the conduct of women), which is a small tract written in Arabic.91
Arguing that women were created for the benefit of men and for the purpose
of continuity of the process of reproduction,92 Shaikh ʿAlī Muṭṭaqī examines
the question whether women have the merit to attain walāyā. Reiterating the
misogynist viewpoint that women are created as deficient in intellect and in
the understanding of faith, Shaikh ʿAli Muṭṭaqī argues further that walāyā
is not decreed for women because all the matters related to women, includ-
ing their bodies and their voices, have to remain veiled and covered (satr wa
ikhfāʾ).93 It is worth mentioning here that Shaikh ʿAlī Muṭṭaqī was not against
women; he supported and patronised the widows with generous cash gifts.94
This tract, al-unwān fi sulūkuʾn-niswān, at some point was also translated into
Persian and was in circulation in India. The Persian tract was translated into
Urdu under a new title, Hidāyatuʾn niswān (Guidance for women), with some
additions and corrections, and was published in 1871, with a second printing in
1872.95 Before examining the contents of this Urdu translation, it is interesting
to recap briefly how and why this book was translated into Urdu. According
to the translator, Maulawī ʿAlī Muḥammad ibn-i Muḥammad Muʿīn, in 1871 a
group of Muslim scholars well-versed in fiqh and Ḥadīth, including himself,
Nawwāb ʿAbdu’l Bāsiṭ Khan, and Munshi Zahīru’d-Dīn, assembled in Lucknow
at the house of an elite of the city, Nawwāb Fidā Ḥasan Khan. The friendly talks
moved to the topic of women’s status and whether women could acquire the
status of a Sufi. After much discussion, the conclusion was drawn that because
of their flawed intelligence (nuqṣān-i ʿaql) and ignoble ways (zamāʾim ʿādāt),

90 For a biographical notice of Shaikh ʿAli Muṭṭaqī, see Ghulām ʿAlī Āzād Bilgrāmī. 1328/1910.
Daftar-i awwal Maʿāsiru’l kirām. Agra: Maṭbaʿ Mufīd-i ʿĀm, pp. 192–94.
91 ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd al-Malik Muttaqī. (Edited by Majdi al-Saiyyid Ibrahim). 1992. al-ʿunwān fi
sulūk an niswān. Qahirah: Maktabat al-Qurʾān. A micro-filmed copy of the actual man-
uscript, no. MF33941, which is thirty paged, and was copied by Aḥmad al-Masirī on 23
Muḥarram, 1107/September 3, 1695, is in the Miṣr Library, Cairo, Egypt. In 1992, Majdi al-
Saiyyid Ibrahim edited it and published it (Qahirah: Maktabat al-Qur’an). All my refer-
ences are from Majdi al-Saiyyid Ibrahim’s edited work.
92 Ibid, p. 27.
93 Ibid, pp. 24–25.
94 Saiyid Athar Abbas Rizvi. 2004. A History of Sufism in India, vol. 2, pp. 319–27.
95 Maulawī ʿAlī Muḥammad ibn-i Muḥammad Muʿīn. 1872. Hidāyatuʾn niswān. Lucknow:
Fakhru’l Maṭabʿ.
170 Chapter 6

women are deprived of these higher stations.96 At this, Munshi Zahīru’d-Dīn

suggested that Shaikh ʿAlī Muṭṭaqī’s book, al-unwān fi sulūkuʾn-niswān, a copy
of which was in his library, was the best and the most authoritative source
on this subject. It was then decided that to propagate this work, it must be
translated into Urdu. The translated version was expanded and more faults of
women were added; extracts from other sources were included to show the
merits of wives’ submission to their husbands in seeking entry into Heaven.
The book sold out and a second printing came out the following year.97 Perhaps
the financial gains of the book encouraged the Munshi Nawal Kishore Press to
print it again. In 1881, a third edition was edited by Maulawī ʿAlī Muḥammad’s
son, Maulawī Muḥammad Ibrāḥīm, for the benefit of the Muslims.98 The new
edition of the book declared that the above details, from the sixteenth cen-
tury to the late nineteenth century, covering vast geographies from India to the
Arab world, are presented here to show the persistence of male rejection of
women to attain walāya.
Contrary to the views of ʿAlī Muṭṭaqī, his near contemporary, ʿAbdu’l Quddūs
Gangohī (d. 944/1537) made significant contributions to the recognition of
women’s merits as spiritual guides. An accomplished theologian, Gangohī
emerged more as a well-recognised Sufi as the number of his disciples grew.99
To propagate his views, Gangohī maintained a hot line of correspondence and
addressed about two hundred letters to rulers, elite, disciples, and relatives on
a variety of themes—themes of Allāh’s worship and following the Tradition of
the Prophet dominated his letters. Of these letters, one remains unique. Letter
number 66 is the only one addressed to a woman, one Bībī Islām Khātūn,
daughter of ʿUmar Khan Sarwāni, a powerful political-military ally of the Lodi
Sultans. The theme of this letter was dar bayān ʿadam jawāz khilāfat bara‌ʾ ye
zanān har chih bākamāl mardāṅ rasad (an explanation of nonexistence of

96 Ibid, p. 2.
97 Maulawī ʿAlī Muḥammad ibn-i Muḥammad Muʿīn. 1872. Hidāyatuʾn niswān. Lucknow:
Fakhru’l Maṭabʿ.
98 Maulawī ʿAlī Muḥammad (marḥūm). 1881. Hidāyatuʾn niswān. Munshi Nawal Kishore
(place not given).
99 For a short biography of Gangohī, see Khwāja Muḥammad Hāshim Kishmī. 1890. Zubdat
al-muqāmāt. Kānpūr: Maṭbaʿ Munshī Nawal Kishore (Urdu translation by Ghulam
Mustafa Khan and Maulānā Abul Fath Saghiruddin. Maṭbaʿ Nuʿmānia, Sialkot, 1407/1987),
pp. 148–55; ʿIjāzu’l Ḥaqq Quddūsī. 1961. Ḥaẓrat ʿAbdu’l Ḥaqq-Quddūs Gangohī ḥayat aur
unkī tʿālīmāt. Karachi: Educational Press; Simon Digby. 1975. “‘Abd al Quddus Gangohi
(1456–1537): The personality and attitude of a medieval Indian Sufi,” in Khaliq Ahmad
Nizami (Edited). Medieval India: a miscellany. (pp. 1–66). (London: Asia Publishing House,
1975).
Women ’ s Presence in Sufi Silsilas 171

justification for women’s khilāfat, albeit they might have reached excellence
of men). Gangohī affirmed the spiritual merits of Bībī Islām Khātūn and rec-
ognised that she was equal to men in her virtues. He also lauded her courage
to step into what he called the men’s world. The patched frock of the Sufis
(khirqā-yi mashāʾiq), however, was declined to her by Gangohī because khilāfat
is not lawful (majāz nāshud) for women.100 Also, the authority to make baiʿāt
was not given to her because of this. Thus, the thirteenth-century argument
of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar when he rejected his daughter as his
successor remained vibrant and strong. Displaying some softening of the rigid-
ity against women’s position, however, Gangohī adopted a rather pliant atti-
tude and permitted Bībī Islām Khātūn to confer the hat (kulāh) and the frock
(dāman) on his behalf (bā wikālat pīr-i khud) to men and women who came to
her and sought her spiritual blessings. She was allowed to confer the frock to
women who could be present or absent, but a hat to men only in absentia. Bībī
Islām Khātūn was also permitted to give them the genealogical table (shajra)
of her silsila, i.e., the Mujaddidī-Naqshbandī silsila, and enrol them as disciples
(murīd) of her Shaikh, ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī.101 Neither of the two sources,
which include the above letter, provide any information about whether Bībī
Islām Khātūn put this significant letter into practice or not.
After a lapse of several centuries, in the late eighteenth century, three strik-
ing examples of women appointed as khalīfas emerge. Interestingly, all three
have connections with Delhi and with the Naqshbandī-Mujaddidī silsila of the
Sufis. Several factors can be identified for this positive stand of male Sufi mas-
ters who still held the final authority of conferring and granting permission
(ijāzat-nāma) to these three women to teach. Probably the new awareness for
recognising women’s worth was related to some extent to the political and eco-
nomic stress experienced by the Muslim community in the wake of the loss
of political authority and to the emerging social chaos that became rampant
throughout the subcontinent of India.
Of these three path-breaking examples, two women Sufis, Ḥaẓrat ʿAjība
Khānam of Panīpat and Ḥaẓrat Mardum Maḥall (d. 1801), were disciples of
Mirzā Mazhar Jān-i-Jānāṅ (d. 1781) of the Naqshbandī-Mujaddidī silsila of
the Sufis. Both were given letters of authorization to teach and enrol women

100 See Part 2 for Bībī Islām Khātūn’s biographical notice.

101 Maulānā Rashīd Aḥmad Gangohī. Fatāwa-i-Rashīdiyya (Kamīl) Fiqh Ḥanafī kā Anmol
Khazīna. Karachi: Dāru’l Ishāʿat, n. d., p. 72. The same letter, with little variation, is trans-
lated in Urdu in Majmūaʿ khuṭūṭ- Maktūbāt Quddūsia Quṭb-i ʿĀlam Ḥaẓrat Shaikh ʿAbdu’l
Quddūs Gangohī. Compiled and translated by Wāḥid Bakhsh Sayāl, Lahore: al-Faisal
(2010), p. 229.
172 Chapter 6

disciples.102 The third woman Sufi was Ḥaẓrat Bībī Ṣāḥiba (d. 1803) whose
influence spread far and wide.103 Ḥaẓrat Ṣafīu’llah, Qayyūm-i Jahan (1746–1798)
of the Mujaddidi silsila conferred upon her the irshād nāma and appointed her
as one of his twenty-eight deputies.104
102 For details, see their biographical notices in Part 2 in this book.
103 For notice on her life, see Part 2 in this book.
104 For the list of deputies, which also included Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s two sons, see Muḥammad
Faẓlu’llah. 1355/1936.ʿUmdat’l Maqāmāt. Lahore: Litho Expert Press, pp. 490–95.
 Chapter 7

Sufi Lodges: Fencing the Sacred and the Profane

7.1 The Khānqāh

The majesty and grandeur of Islam’s religious architecture, with men praying
therein, is said to have been inspired by the following Surah of the Qurʾān in
An-Nūr (24: 36–37):

(Lit such a Light) in houses, which Allāh hath permitted to be raised to

honour; for celebration, in them, of His name: In them is He glorified in
the morning and in the evenings again and again).
By men whom neither traffic nor merchandise can divert from the
Remembrance of Allāh nor from regular prayer nor from the practice of
regular charity: their (only) fear is for the day when hearts and eyes will
be transformed (in a world wholly new).

In addition to the growth of Sufi ṭarīqās, the development of the Sufi lodges,
known as khānqāhs or khānaqāhs, from small to large splendid establish-
ments, runs parallel to the glorification and splendour of the political and
military grandeur of the Islamic states throughout the medieval and early
modern age.1 Concurrently, it also resulted in three significant factors playing
a three-way centric role in Muslim society: (a) an on-going power equation
between and among the pīrs and politico-military power holders; (b) maximis-
ing religious tenets in the common interest of the trio mentioned above; and,
(c) sermonising and legitimising subservience of women and children to their
[male] dictates.
Scholars have studied the emergence, development, and roles and functions
of the khānqāhs as lodges for the travelling Sufis, qalandars, ʿulamāʾ, and even
common wayfarers in need of temporary shelter.2 Several queries emerge from
these studies asking if these khānqāhs were centres of spirituality and knowl-
edge. Were these symbols of tussles and disputes between the supremacy of

1 For details, see John Renard. 1996. Seven Doors to Islam: Spirituality and the Religious Life of
Muslims. University of California Press, pp. 168–77.
2 In the context of South Asia, Nizami’s study of the Khānqāhs is one of the best assessments,
though any reference to women is completely missing. See Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 1978. Some
Aspects of Religion and Politics in India during the Thirteenth Century. Delhi: Idara Adabiyat-i
Delhi, pp. 181–229.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_009

174 Chapter 7

the walāyā of the Sufi and the wilāyat of the Sulṭan?3 Were these, like royal
courts, spaces marked more for male performances and less for women’s roles?
Do these structures stand today as reminiscent symbols and glorious illustra-
tions of Islam’s past splendour? This book, however, rereads all these accounts
to assess how and in what ways the khānqāhs draw lines alienating women
further from the sacred and more toward the profane universe.
Thus, the subject of women and the khānqāhs becomes a legitimate theme
for exploration because of the marked male presence within their premises
and the total male control over their management. Development of Sufi
khānqāh coincides with the political-military growth of Muslim power in vari-
ous geographic settings. Established to serve as a centre for spiritual training
and promoting knowledge of the Qurʾān, Ḥadīth, and fiqh, these places soon
developed into lodgings for travellers and wayfarers, gradually becoming more
the embodiment of the mundane authority of the Sufi silsilas and less of the
spiritual blessings.4 Known to have appeared first in Iran, the khānqāhs later
came to be known by various other appellations, such as zāwiya (retreat, liter-
ally corner), takya or tekke (small resting/prayer chambers of Sufis), jamāʿat
khāna, and ribāṭ.5 By the fourteenth century, the number of these hospices
reached two thousand in and around the city of Delhi alone.6
Sheila Blair’s research about the fourteenth-century shrine complexes in
Iran, Egypt, and Algeria, including the khānqāhs, looks beyond the mortar
and bricks of these edifices and captures the intent behind the human effort
in constructing and managing such architectural pieces. Blair concludes that
“these were not places of retreat like early ribāṭs where poor, needy or mysti-
cally minded people sought asylum from the world, but were social establish-
ments in which the place of the dead was commemorated by veneration of
the living.”7 These hospices were Sufi complexes run by male Sufis, some even
commemorating dead male Sufis. Indeed, some of these khānqāhs together
with mausoleums are marvels of the art of Islam.

3 For a discussion on the concept of these two terms, see Kashf, pp. 259–260.
4 John Spencer Trimingham. 1971. The Sufi orders in Islam. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 5–11,
17–23, 168–72.
5 Marcia K. Hermansen. 1995. “Khānqāh,” The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic
world. Oxford University Press: 2: pp. 415–17; also, Ahmet T. Karamustafa. 2007. Sufism. The
Formative Period. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, pp. 120–122.
6 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 1978. Some Aspects of Religion and Politics in India during the
Thirteenth Century. Delhi: Idara-i Adabiyat-i Delhi, p. 175.
7 Sheila S. Blair. 1990. “Sufi saints and shrine architecture in the early fourteenth century”.
Muqarnas, vol. 7 (1): 35–49.
Sufi Lodges 175

Because of the growing apprehension that the khānqāhs were emerging

as promoters of extra-Islamic ways of life, encouraging and practicing adula-
tion, almost idolization of the murshid or the pīr, condemnation soon surfaced
against the khānqāhs. This opposition to the khānqāhs continues to exist until
today. Ibn al-Jawzī (d. 597/1200), a Ḥaṇbalī scholar, in his treatise Talbīs Iblīs
(Devil’s Deception), added a section titled “Devil’s deception of them [the
Sufis] with regard to their place of residence.” In it he describes the khānqāh
life as one that is against Islam’s traditions as it encourages celibacy and opu-
lent lifestyle supported by the ill-gotten wealth of tyrant rulers.8 Shihābu’d-Dīn
Abū Ḥafs ʿUmar Suhrawardī (d. 1234), the author of the most read treatise on
Sufi etiquettes, the ʿAwārifu’l-maʿārif, also did not favour the construction of
these houses of spiritual assemblies under royal patronage.9 In his work Kitāb
fi’l-futuwwat, Abu Ḥafs criticises and disparages Sufi Shaikhs who build and run
their khānqāhs with money given by the rulers and moneyed people (mulūk
wa umāra‌ʾ).10 Despite Abu Ḥafs’s criticism of the khānqāhs, splendid lodges
emerged all over, including South Asia, some built under royal patronage, and
continue to thrive on generous state grants and endowments.
Ibn Taymiīyah (d. 728/1327) expressed similar concerns about the khānqāhs.
It is relevant here to know a little more about Ibn Taymiīyah’s views as he
looked at the khānqāhs as an innovation. This Damascus-born scholar spent
his whole life, until his death in prison in 1327, advocating ijtihād (reasoning)
for comprehending the Qurʾān. Among several other innovative practices
that in his view were not in line with the Qurʾān, was the construction of the
khānqāhs, zāwiyas, and the jamāʿat khānās and the life spent in them.11
Karamustafa refers to two legal opinions or fatāwā of Ghazālī (d. 1111), one
in Arabic and the other in Persian, regarding the nature, purpose, and eti-
quettes of khānqāh living. In his fatwā, Ghazālī explained major and minor
sins that disqualify a Sufi from receiving endowment funds. Among the minor
sins according to Ghazālī, writes Karamustafa, was included sitting alone with

8 Abū al-Faraj ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn ʿAlī Ibn al-Jawzī and Haitham Hamdan. 2014. The Devil’s
Deceptions: Being a Translation of His Masterpiece ‘Talbīs iblīs. Birmingham: Dār as-
Sunnah Publishers, pp. 289–90.
9 Shaikh Shihābuddin ʿUmar Suhrawardī bin Muḥammad-i Suhrawardī, and Henry
Wilberforce Clarke. 1891. The ʿAwārifu’l-maʿārif, written in the thirteenth century. Calcutta:
Government of India Central Printing Office, pp. 23–26.
10 For more on this, see Lloyd Ridgeon. 2011. Jawanmardi. A Sufi Code of Honour. Edinburgh:
Edinburgh University Press.
11 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 1990. “The Impact of Ibn Taimiyya on South Asia.” Journal of
Islamic Studies, 1(1):120–149.
176 Chapter 7

women, even if it was done occasionally.12 Suhrāwardī’s ʿAwārifu’l-maʿārif,

which describes different types of Sufi lodges and the rules to be followed by
the Sufis who stay there or serve there, nowhere mentions any role or presence
of women in the khānqāh. Suhrawardī was convinced that the khānqāh was a
space marked for men only.13

7.2 Khānqāhs in South Asia

Although we have no recorded evidence to show the exact chronology of the

construction of the khānqāhs in South Asia, it is assumed that some form
of hospices did begin to grow, primarily to provide shelter and refuge to the
wandering mystics and seekers of Truth. Thus, both in Hujwīrī and much later
in the Fawa‌ʾidu’l-fuʾād, there are references to the male Sufis’ shared abodes.
The number of such facilities grew in proportion to the number of those who
sought them. One can safely assume that a fair number of Sufi lodges of variant
sizes and resources existed in the formative period of the Muslim community
in Lahore, Ajodhan, Uchch, and later in Delhi. It is fascinating to study how in
the backdrop of its all-male occupancy with almost zero female visibility, the
khānqāh transformed Sufism to an all-male institution. The khānqāhi Sufism,
a product of a powerful political-cultural setting, sustained and nurtured by
the state grants or public donations, quintessentially grew into a symbol of
male authority. Whereas documents exist for some state grants, textual evi-
dence for public donations is scarce, except a few epigraphic evidences or waqf
records. Curiously, women who were largely kept at the edge of the khānqāhs
and whose entry into the precincts of its sacred space was viewed as practically
a sacrilegious act, patronised them through generous donations, endowments,
and even as their original builders.14
Nizami says that a khānqāh served three purposes: “It offered shelter for the
mystics who have no home of their own; it provides the setting for fostering
a communitarian discipline, and in that setting the residents can offer both

12 Ahmet T. Karamustafa. 2007. Sufism. The Formative Period. Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univer-
sity Press, pp. 126–27.
13 ʿAbd al-Qāhir ibn ʿAbd Allāh Suhrawardī. (Edited by Tawfīq ʿAlī Wahbah). 2006. ʿAwārif-
al-maʿārif. al-Qāhirah: Maktabat al-Thaqāfah al-Dīnīyah, pp. 112–136; The ‘Awārifu-l-maʿārif,
written in the thirteenth century (1891), pp. 23–26.
14 D. Fairchild Ruggles (Edited). 2000. Women, Patronage, and Self-Representation in Islamic
Societies. New York: SUNY.
Sufi Lodges 177

support and mutually constructive criticism.”15 Khwāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i

Dihlī, however, defined khānqāh as a house of worship where prayers and
supplications are heard and answered speedily.16 What differentiated the
khānqāhs of South Asia from those of the other Muslim countries, especially
of the Arab world, was that these grew up around a holy man and became
associated with his ṭarīqa and method of discipline and exercises.17 Thus, the
khānqāh hallowed the personality of the Shaikh—a male, obviously.
Sultan Muḥammad bin Tughluq, much influenced by Ibn Taymiīyah’s phi-
losophy, even went to the extent of calling all Sufi beliefs heresy. Thus, for a
while, the Sufi lodges in Delhi looked abandoned as the Sufis were dispersed
and sent away to take up various administrative assignments in other regions
of the Sultanate.18 In hindsight, Delhi’s ruination proved a boon as it spread
the Sufi message to areas where there had been no presence of Muslims before.
A greater need was now there for the Sufi lodges to shelter and house the
uprooted Sufis in cities elsewhere than Delhi and its environs.
It is important to note that the khānqāhs in their early stages in India
attracted a great number of visitors, largely males, who came there with a vari-
ety of purposes. To an ordinary Indian Muslim male, probably not too familiar
with the religious texts in Arabic but who could easily watch and witness life in
and around the khānqāhs, these edifices were next in sanctity to a mosque and
a place where one could learn through audition and by observation.
Probably because of these reasons, the Ghiyāspur jamāʿat-khāna (the house
of congregation), the earliest built khānqāh of Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ,
magnetically attracted visitors each day, including some women as well.19 Built
in the serene village of Ghiyāspur on the banks of river Jamuna, in the suburbs
of Delhi, the place was hard to reach even by males. Distance, coupled with dif-
ficult modes of travelling for women, made the jamāʿat-khāna more a place of
congregation for men rather than for women. The lodge consisted of an open
courtyard, a big hall in the centre, flanked by two small chambers, accessed
through a walled veranda. All the residents of the khānqāh rested, slept, ate,
and prayed in the open and were watched by the others. There were no private

15 K.A. Nizami. 1957. ‘Some aspects of Khānqāh life in medieval India.’ Studia Islamica, 8:
51–70.
16 KM, Majils 75.
17 John Spencer Trimingham. 1971. The Sufi orders in Islam. Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. 22.
18 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 1990. “The Impact of ibn Taimiyya on South Asia.” Journal of
Islamic Studies, 1(1):120–149.
19 For a thorough description of the jamāʿat- khāna, see Nisar Ahmad Faruqi. 1978. Tazkira
Ḥazrat Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ-Khānqah-i mubarak ki ek jhalak. New Delhi: Khwāja
Ḥasan Nizāmi Memorial Society, pp. 23–46.
178 Chapter 7

quarters or covered areas for women. A small wooden structure accessed by

a wooden staircase was the private chamber for the Shaikh. Service quarters
consisted of a free kitchen (langar-khānā) and storage areas for grains and
other edible items. This simple purpose-built structure emerged as an eyesore
to the imperial power and a sanctuary of peace for thousands of people who
visited it every day, covering long distances on foot; some lodged there for sev-
eral days while others were permanent residents.20
Undoubtedly, a khānqāh was an open house for spiritual discourses, exchange
of views, and performance of ritualistic prayers and mystical exercises. Here,
books were shared, introduced, and read. Assemblies of meditation and
remembrance were held, Qurʾān was recited, sessions of samāʿ were held, and
meals were eaten and shared with the poor and the wayfarer with no distinc-
tion. The sermon and the discourse of the Shaikh, the samāʿ, and the free com-
munity meals (langar), all were enough to transport an ordinary person, albeit
for a short period of time, to a new experience, away from the worries of the
mundane realities.21 The khānqāh, however, served another purpose as well.
More than its male needs-oriented construction, management, and the daily
working of the khānqāh, the language and the idiom of the discourses held
on its premises turned the khānqāh into a bastion of male authority, distanc-
ing women further away from it and thereby creating a falsified male-female
dichotomic perception of a Sufi. It is important to understand that the pri-
mary sources of South Asian Sufi history, the malfūzāt, were produced within
the premises of the khānqāhs with the active participation of three agents:
the Shaikh, the audience, and the scribe. The Shaikh held the discourse, often
triggered by a query from the audience, who listened with rapt attention and
spread it further by word of mouth; and finally, the scribe recorded it and pre-
served it for the next generations. All through its journey, from the spoken
to the audited and written word, the malfūz remained male in vision, form,
and purpose.

20 Ibid.
21 For contemporary eye-witnessed account of the khānqāh and the langar which also
included vegetarian meals, see the devotional narrative penned in Persian by Rajkumār
Har Dev, a Hindu chieftain from Deogir, under the title of Chehel Roza (A Discourse of
Forty Days). See its Urdu version, Niẓāmī Dihlawī, Khwāja Ḥasan Niẓāmī Dihlawī. 1945.
Chishtī Awliyāʾ Nāma: Niẓāmī bansrī: tārīkh-i Awliyā: tamām nāmwar khwājgān-i Chisht
kī zindagī ke ḥālāt aur Sulṭānu’l Mashāʾikh Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Sayyid Niẓāmuddīn Awliyā
maḥbūb Ilāhī kī pūrī zindagī kā tazkira. Delhi: Ahl-i Bait Press; Rājkumār Hardev and
Maḥmūdurraḥmān. 2000. Niẓāmī Bansrī: Ḥazrat Khwāja Maḥbūb Ilāhī Sultān Niẓāmuddīn
Awliyā kī sawāniḥ ʿumrī. Islāmabad: Dost Publications.
Sufi Lodges 179

7.3 Women’s Khānqāhs

Reading the above description of khānqāhs raises a natural query: were there
or are there any khānqāhs for women? Trimingham refers to women’s hermit-
ages or convents known as ribāṭ.22 Donald Little, with reference to Asyūtī (d.
1455), describes separate women’s khānqāhs under the Māmlūks as “a house
(dār) of good appearance, solid construction, in good repair, containing living
quarters (masākīn), assembly rooms (majālis), closets (makhādiʿ), and duplex
(ṭibāq).”23 Female hospices for single, divorced, and widowed women started
in Aleppo in the twelfth century; references to women’s lodges are also found
in the Fatimid period. Female Sufis might have also lived in these hospices.
Karammustafa’s view that possibly these ribāṭs or khānqāhs “were charitable
hospices for abandoned women, widows and divorcees, rather than lodges
specifically for female Sufis,” appears plausible.24 Most of these lodges were
built and patronised by elite women.25
Whereas we find a few examples of mosques with women’s galleries in South
Asia, no evidence has yet come to light about women’s separate Sufi lodges or
khānqāhs. One such example of women-only mosques is of the Lal Darwaza
masjid built by Bibi Rāji (d. 1477), the Queen of Sultan Maḥmūd Shāh Sahrqi
(r. 1440–1457) of the Sharqi Sultanate.26 Afshan Bukhari also refers to zenana
or women’s prayer section in the Jami Masjid, Agra, built by Jahān Ārāʾ Begum
(1614–1681), daughter of the Mughal Emperor Shāh Jahan (r. 1628–1658) and a
Sufi. Bukhari describes some “devotional Sufi rituals” that local women per-
form in this area on Thursday evenings. Bukhari writes, “Women light incense,
and make flower and candle effigies while performing the Sufiāna kalām or
mystical poetry. At the end, the group recites a supplication for Jahān Ārāʾ or
Fāṭima Begum, their patron saint and the patron of the mosque. They dip their

22 Trimingham, 1971. The Sufi Orders in Islam. Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. 18.
23 Donald P. Little, 1991. ‘The nature of khānqāh, Ribāt, ̣ and Ẓāwiyas under the Māmlūks.’ In
Islamic Studies Presented to Charles J. Adams. Edited by Adams, Charles J., Wael B. Hallaq,
and Donald P. Little. Leiden: E.J. Brill, pp. 91–107.
24 Ahmet T. Karamustafa. 2007. Sufism. The Formative Period. Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univer-
sity Press, p. 126.
25 Yasser Tabaa. ‘Ḍayfa Khatūn, Regent Queen and Architectural Patron,’ in D. Fairchild
Ruggles (Edited), Women, Patronage, and Self-Representation in Islamic Societies. New
York: SUNY, 2000. pp. 17–34; Yossef Rapoport. 2005. Marriage, Money and Divorce in
Medieval Islamic Society. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (especially Ch. 2).
26 See Anton Führer. 1889. The Sharqi Architecture of Jaunpur: With Notes on Zafarabad,
Sahet-Mahet and Other Places in the North-Western Provinces and Oudh. Calcutta: Thacker,
pp. 29–40; K.B. Mawlwi Muhammad Fasihuddin. 1922. The Sharqi Monuments of Jaunpur.
Allahabad: Empire Press, p. 34.
180 Chapter 7

palms in henna and leave its ‘mark’ as a sign of their spiritual devotion on the
qibla wall. Jahān Ārāʾ’s spiritual authority is evoked and memorialized in the
performative site of her patronage through ritualized Sufi practice.” Bukhari,
however, observes that it is unknown whether this practice is an earlier prac-
tice or is of recent origin.27
One significant evidence of a khānqāh’s name associated with a woman is
found in Bidar, Deccan. Named as the khānqāh of Ḥaẓrat Minnat-ullah Bībī
Ṣāḥiba, according to an inscription found on a black stone tablet on one of
the walls, it dates back to the mid-fifteenth century. Architectural details
and carved embellishments reflect Bahmani style. The khānqāh must have
been an important place as it was later renovated in 1108/1696. Yazdani, who
has described this khānqāh, explains that its importance was due to Ḥaẓrat
Minnat-ullah Bībī Ṣāḥiba who “took an active interest in the propagation of
the religious doctrines of the Chishtiyya order of ṣūfīs.”28 Ḥaẓrat Minnat-ullah
Bībī Ṣaḥiba was Khwāja Bandā Nawāz’s great-granddaughter, i.e., the grand-
daughter of his daughter Bībī Khwānja Batūl Khātūn and her husband Saiyyid
Salār Lahori.
It is significant to note here that women’s spiritual experience, their search
for the Divine, and their longing for the Divine were experiences that most
pious women preferred to have in seclusion and privacy rather than in the
company of others. This does not mean confinement as confinement usually
comes from outside. Furthermore, the living areas are defined as sanctified
places where daily prayers are offered by women without any loss of reward or
merit (sawāb). Consequently, most women felt free in their spiritual journeys.

7.4 Women’s Presence in Sufi Lodges

As mosques were already off-limits to women, though women’s presence was

not prohibited, the khānqāhs as the next most profound space of male pres-
ence and male authority emerged as the most effective agent in distancing
women not only from “sacred” spaces but also from public spaces. As discussed
above, Sufi lodges, similar to mosques, were primarily meant for men, both in
their intent and in their architectural designs. This comparison creates some
further questions. For instance, were women banned from these abodes of

27 Afshan Bokhari. 2008. “The “Light” of the Timuria: Jahan Ara Begum’s Patronage, Piety
and Poetry in 17th century Mughal India.” Marg, 60(1): 53–61.
28 Ghulām Yazdani. Bidar, its History and Monuments. (London: Oxford University Press,
1947), pp. 208–11, (henceforth, referred to as Bidar, its History and Monuments), p. 113.
Sufi Lodges 181

spiritual retreat that also served as open assemblies for moral discourses? Were
any restrictions imposed on women’s entry into these houses that, in the words
of Nizami, were built for “inculcating community spirit among the mystics and
for the moral and spiritual culture of the people”?29 A closer perusal of the
primary South Asian Sufi texts shows several instances where women played
both direct and indirect roles in the day-to-day life of the khānqāhs. Nizami,
who has studied and sifted through almost all the sources on North Indian
Sufis, writes that the doors of the khānqāh of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ
were open to women and to his bait-i ʿām (a house of the common people)
women were admitted.30 Jamālī’s story of a poor woman who earned a little by
spinning thread (resmān) in the neighbourhood of the Ghiyāspur khānqāh of
Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ is worth retelling here. The story is from the early
days of Ghiyāspur when its resources, both in cash and kind, were scant. Once,
in those years, the residents of the khānqāh went without food for several days.
This pious woman who was also a disciple of the Shaikh (paiwand dāsht), sent
about a half-seer of uncooked barley flour without salt to the khānqāh. Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ received it as a welcome gift, as perhaps this alone could
satisfy the hunger of the residents. While this flour was mixed with water and
boiled, most probably as a flour-gruel, a wandering qalandar stopped by and
demanded food. On being told that the pot was still getting ready, the qalan-
dar in his anger ordered Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ to bring it immediately. The
qalandar ate by putting his hand in the hot boiling pot while the Shaikh was
holding it by his hands. Soon, the qalandar smashed the hot boiling vessel,
spilling all the flour-broth on to the ground, and went away. This fistful of flour
bought by the hard labour of a poor woman opened the floodgates of never-
ending futūh for the khānqah. In Jamālī ‘s words, such large number of gifts,
both in cash and kind, began to arrive that it is not possible to record them all
( fatūḥ wa shukrāna rasīdan girift kih zabṭ-i taḥrīr na ganjad). The number of
persons seeking discipleship and receiving the cloak of spiritual succession
also increased. The fame of the khānqāh’s charismatic and miraculous pow-
ers spread to such an extent that Jamālī found it hard to document them.31
Hagiographical in nature, this anecdote is one of those untold contacts that
women had with the khānqāhs. Of course, all history—factual, fictional, or
hagiographical—depends on how it is recorded, read, and interpreted.

29 K.A. Nizami. 1957. “Some Aspects of Khānqah Life in Medieval India.” Studia Islamica. 8:
51–69. for more on the khānqāhs, see John Renard. 1996. Seven Doors to Islam: Spirituality
and the Religious Life of Muslims. University of California Press.
30 K.A. Nizami. 2004. Nizamuddin Auliya. New Delhi: National Book Trust.
31 Jamālī, pp. 69–70.
182 Chapter 7

In the jamāʿat khāna of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Din Masʿūd Ganj-i-Shakkar (d. 1265),

Bībī Rānī, a murīd and the paternal grandmother of Amīr Khwurd, the author
of Siyār ul-awliyāʾ, used to serve the residents, even the unrelated ones. The
next part of this book, the Biographical Notices, include several references to
women who resided within the khānqāhs; they had conversations with males
who either stayed there or were visiting, and they also offered their regular
prayers there. An episode recorded by ʿAbdul Jabbār Khan Mulkapurī about
Ḥaẓrat Shāh Bihārī Chishtī of Burhanpur (d. 907/1501) further evidences not
only the presence of women within the precincts of the khānqāhs but also
illustrates that they were assigned supervisory and managerial functions of the
khānqāhs.32 Thus, Ḥaẓrat Shāh Bihārī Chishtī, a migrant Sufi from Ajodhan,
belonging to the august family of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Din Masʿūd Ganj-i-Shakkar,
assigned the administration and supervision of his khānqāh to his elder pious
sister.33 Around the early seventeenth century, another Sufi woman, Khadīja
Bībī, of the Chishtī silsila, according to Gulzār-i Abrār looked after the manage-
ment of the shrines of her male Sufi relatives in Mandu.34
Muḥammad Ghausī Shaṭṭārī narrates another example of a woman manager
of a khānqāh in Patan, Gujarat. When Shaikh Hāṅsā Bukhārī, a descendant of
the family of Makhdūm Jahāṅiaṅ Jahāṅgasht, died in 1005 or 1006/1596–1597,
he was buried in the courtyard of his house. He had a sister by the name of
Buzurg who became the mujāwir (shrine attendant) of her brother’s tomb.
Known for her meditation and Allāh’s remembrance, Ghausī, who knew her
personally, writes that signs of wilāyat were manifest in her.35
As late as the eighteenth century, Shāh Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī (d. 1729) used
to admit women to his khānqāh in Delhi. One such assembly in which women

32 ʿAbdu’l Jabbār Khan Mulkapurī, Maḥbūb al-zilmanān: tazkira-yi-awliyāʾ-yi-dakan (ḥiṣṣa

awwal, jild som) Hyderabad: Hassan Press, 1331/1912, pp. 213–221. (Henceforth, referred to
as Maḥbūb al-zilmanān: tazkira-yi-awliyāʾ-yi-dakan); Saiyyid Imāmu’d-Dīn Aḥmad Naqwī
Ḥanafī Gulshanābādī. 1322/1904. Baarkātu’l Awliyāʾ. Dihli: Afzalu’l Maṭābaʿ (new edition,
2015, Nasik), pp. 129–131 (henceforth, referred to as Barakātu’l Awliyāʾ); Rizvi, Saiyid Athar
Abbas. 2004. A History of Sufism in India, vol. 2, pp. 283–4; For a biographical notice, see
N. Hanif. 2000. Biographical Encyclopaedia of Sufis: South Asia. New Delhi: Sarup & Sons,
pp. 297–98 (henceforth, referred to as Biographical Encyclopaedia of Sufis: South Asia). In
public memory, Ḥaẓrat Shāh Bhikārī Chishtī is Sarkar-i Burhanpur (master of Burhanpur).
33 Shāh Bhikārī Chishtī was the son of Shaikh Yusuf (d. 850/1446), an eighth-generation
descendant of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar and who was a highly respected Sufi of
Burhanpur, See Maḥbūb al-zilmanān: tazkira-yi-awliyāʾ-yi-dakkan (ḥiṣṣa awwal, jild som),
Ibid., p. 214.
34 Azkār-i Abrār, p. 219.
35 Azkār-i abrār, pp. 419–20. Shaikh Hāṅsā Bukhāri migrated in 1003/ 1594 from Patan to
Ahmedabad at the instance of one Sayyid Qāsim son of Sayyid Maḥmūd Barha of the
Emperor’s Akbar’s era.
Sufi Lodges 183

were present is described by Khwāja Muḥammad Kamgār Khan Ḥusainī, a dis-

ciple of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Aurangābādi, an eyewitness who stayed in Delhi for two
weeks in 1719 and visited the khānqāh at least fourteen times.36 Due to poverty
and accumulating debt,37 Shāh Kalīmu’llah did not have a separate hospice,
but used his own house (khānā ye khud) as his khānqāh.38
Another category of women, whose presence at the khānqāhs is generally
overlooked in studies on Sufism, is women employed to perform low-cadre
jobs for the male inmates, for instance, sweeping and cleaning the premises,
cooking meals, and grinding the floor. Indeed, we know little about the lives
of these women as Sufi chronicles have minimal records of their presence. A
close study of these texts, however, shows that despite the rigid views regard-
ing women’s presence in an assembly of unrelated men, and heated polem-
ics on close male-female proximity, there are several instances where women
were employed either to clean the khānqāhs’ premises or to cook meals for the
Sufis and were constantly under the watchful eyes of men. Thus, for example,
the very first known khānqāh, which Jamālī calls takiyā,39 and where assem-
blies of samāʾ were frequently held and Sufis’ visiting Delhi used to stay,40 was
founded by the Chishtī mystic, Shaikh Abū Bakr Ṭūsī Qalandarī (d. 639/1249),
on the banks of river Yamuna. This khānqāh maintained a large kitchen for pre-
paring meals for feasts and the langar. Here, a young woman cook was hired
to prepare meals for the male Sufis.41 Identified anonymously as kanīz, this
young woman could have been either a slave girl bought for the premises or a
maidservant hired to cook. Narrated in Ahsanu’l-aqwāl, the malfūz of another
Chishtī Sufi, Khwāja Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb, by Ḥammād Kashānī, this story
gets endorsed, albeit indirectly, by three male Sufis—Shaikh Abū Bakr Ṭūsī,
Khwāja Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb, and Ḥammād Kashānī. In this story, to pacify
the passions of a young novice enamoured by the looks of this maid, Abū Bakr
Ṭūsī, instead of reprimanding him for breaching the Sufi conduct, offered to
give him another suitable girl. Such a transaction, even if it is used as a mere
trope, conveys a negative image of the hospice, and raises some serious ques-
tions. For instance, why were young female cooks hired for an all-male estab-
lishment? Why did Shaikh Abū Bakr Ṭūsī, instead of taking stern action against
the young errant novice, merely call him a liar (kāzib) for quickly agreeing

36 Khwāja Muḥammad Kamgār Khan Ḥussaini. Majālis-i Kalimī (Edited by ʿAbdu’l ʿAzīz
Sāḥir). Islamabad: Idara Farogh Maʿārif Nizāmīyya, 2016.
37 Maktūbāt Kalīmī, 1, Letter no. 17, p. 2.
38 Ibid, Letter no. 21, p. 31.
39 Jamālī, p. 67.
40 AA, p. 73.
41 Aḥsanu’l aqwāl, p. 73.
184 Chapter 7

to accept another female in exchange? Were girls easily available to be used

in such exchanges and that, too, on the premises of a khānqāh? In another
instance, the floor of the hospice of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn in Ajodhan was swept
by women workers. These and several other such instances of women’s pres-
ence within the khānqāh illustrate that opposition was not to the physical
presence of women; it was women’s claim to a recognised position or status
that was opposed. Thus, roles of subordination were acceptable but positions
of parity were not.
ʿAbdul Jabbār Khan Mulkapurī’s account of Ḥaẓrat Shāh Shāhbāz (d. 934/
1527), a Sufi of Burhanpur whose miraculous powers attracted a large number
of devotees to his khānqāh, narrates a story about a pious old woman. This
woman, who had performed baiʿat at his hand, used to stay in one corner of
the khānqāh, spending her time in meditation and remembrance (zikr wa
shughul). One day, Ḥaẓrat Shāh Shāhbāz gave her the glad tidings that he had
received in his dream (bashārat) that because of her sincere acts of worship,
she would soon be honoured by the Manifestation of Allāh (tajallī-yi khāṣ).
Hearing this, the woman went into wajd (ecstasy) and while weeping lost her
senses. The episode is significant as it shows that not only women were pres-
ent in the khānqāhs but also that male inmates of the khānqāhs interacted
with them.42
Although several other such examples could be examined from other less
explored sources, it is significant to note that a strong view persists among the
Muslims prohibiting women’s presence in precincts marked primarily as male
domains.
42 Maḥbūb al-zilmanān: tazkira-yi-awliyāʾ-yi dakan, pp. 449–54.
 Chapter 8

Sufi Shrines: Manifesting the Deceased Sufi

Although scientifically generated statistics to show the proportion of male-

female shrine visitation is not available, generally it is estimated that women,
despite restrictions on their mobility and the presence of religious decrees
against their grave visitation, come to the shrines in fairly large numbers. Some
anthropological and ethnographic studies of shrine visitation which tend to
focus more, on the presence of women devotees in shrine complexes, as com-
pared to men visitors, have also projected a female face of a shrine visitor.
In South Asia, shrines, which in popular estimation are next to any other
sacred space, are known by several names. A popular word is dargāh, a Farsi
word which means portal, threshold, a royal court shrine or tomb. Another is
mazār, an Arabic word which means a place of visitation, a shrine, a sepulchre.
Shrines often are also known as darbār, a Farsi word which means a place of
dwelling, hall of audience, a royal court. Another term used is ziyārat, an Arabic
word meaning visiting a shrine or making a pilgrimage to a sacred place.
A shrine is essentially a piece of funerary architecture built over the physical
remains of a deceased person. Along with citadels, forts, and other masonry
icons of royal authority, the dargāh emerged signifying the spiritual domain’s
symbol of power. In most instances, not only were the shrines built with the
money coming from the state treasury, but state grants were made for their
maintenance as well. Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn, and so also Nizāmu’d-Din Awliyāʾ
and his successor, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn, refused to accept state grants.1 Khwāja
Gīsū Darāz, however, took an exceptional step and accepted state grants for his
khānqah in Gulbarga.2 While grants and monetary assistance were refused by
the living mystics, grand structures to commemorate the dead Sufis, even the
Chishtīs, were constructed by royal patrons.3 Some of these sublime structures
have survived ravages, some have been repaired, and a large number have been
lost for several reasons. It is significant to note Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Din Awliyāʾ’s
disapproval of raising permanent structures over graves. In response to a query

1 FF, Majlis 7, of 19 Jamādiʾul awwal, 712/1312; Nizami, K.A. 1948. “Early Indo-Muslim Mystics
and their Attitude towards the State.” Islamic Culture, 22 (4): 397–98.
2 Fatima Zahra Bilgrami. 2005. History of the Qadiri Order in India: 16th–18th Century. Delhi:
Idarah-i Adabiyat-i Delli, p. 5.
3 For royal patronage to the Chishtī dargahs, see Iqtidar Husain Siddiqui. 1989. ‘The Early
Chishti Dargahs.’ in Christian W. Troll (Edited), Muslim Shrines in India: Their Character,
History and Significance. (Delhi: OUP, 1989). (pp. 223).

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_010

186 Chapter 8

of Amīr Ḥasan Sijzi on whether repairing dilapidated graves was permissible,

the Shaikh categorically said, even if it is in ruins, do not repair it (har chih kharāb
shud pesh ʿimārat nā-bāyad kard) because the more decrepit a grave is, the
greater the hope for Mercy (har chih indirās beshtar ummīd-i raḥmat beshtar).4
The deceased saint, Sufi anecdotes show, is not a dead person in the ordi-
nary meaning. A story told by Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Din Awliyāʾ to his audience
supports this stand. In this story, Aḥmad, one of the Shaikh’s friends from
Badayun, though illiterate, was a highly devout person with the virtues of an
abdāl and often discussed and investigated religious issues. Sometime after
his death, he appeared in a dream of Nizāmu’d-Din Awliyāʾ, and as usual, he
questioned certain issues regarding religion and faith. When the Shaikh won-
dered why all these queries as he was dead, Aḥmad asked the Shaikh, “Do you
deem friends of Allāh as dead?”5 Following his usual practice of instructing his
audience through parables and anecdotes, Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Din Awliyāʾ was
simply explaining that virtuous and pious persons are not dead in the normal
sense of being dead.
The above narrative thus is a prologue to the Chishtī Sufis’ devotion for the
dargāh and their belief that a dead Sufi accepts their salutations, listens to
their supplications, and is capable of giving his blessings and benedictions.
Another episode from Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ’s discourses illustrates it further.
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ narrated that when Bābā Farīd was seriously ill towards
the end of his life, he commanded him and a few other fellow disciples to
spend the night at a certain shrine/cave (ḥazīrā) praying for his health. As
told, they all spent the night there and prayed for his recovery. In the morning,
on their return, they could see that their supplications and prayers were not
answered.6 In another Assembly of 23rd of Ramaẓān, Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ not
only repeated the above story but also added Bābā Farīd’s comment that their
supplications made no effect. Recalling his mother, Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ said
that several times when she fell ill, she asked him to visit the shrines of saints
and martyrs and pray for her recovery. On his return, she would say that her
health showed signs of improvement.7 The moral of these stories is that effec-
tiveness of supplications is neither caused by the power of the dead saint nor
by the humility of the supplicant; supplications are answered by Allāh. Indeed,
Saiyyid Muḥammad Ashraf Jahāngīr Simnānī (d. 1437) explained his firm faith
that the Chishtī Sufis—Khwāja Muʿīnu’d-Dīn, Khwāja Bakhtiyār Kākī, Khwāja

4 FF, Majlis 67 of 23 Rajab, 719 H.

5 FF, Majlis 5, 15th of Muḥarram of 710/1310.
6 FF, Majlis 8, 27th of Rabiʿ al-awwal, 710/ 1310.
7 FF, Majlis 17, 23rd of Ramaẓān, 710/1310.
Sufi Shrines 187

Farīdu’d-Dīn, and Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ—though buried under the

dust, are all blessed with virtue of hearing and responding to the supplications
as their supernatural powers continue in death (tassaruf dar maqām-i fānī bāqī
ast).8 In the context of this book, these episodes show that shrine visitation
was not only approved by the Sufi Shaikhs, but they performed it themselves
and commanded their disciples to visit and seek Allāh’s blessings with the help
of the dead saints’ intercession.
To the devotees, the physical space of a dargāh, therefore, personifies the
physically absent (ghāʾib) saint who is capable of bestowing blessings on
the devotee. Most of the Sufis were buried within or close to their hospice. The
masonry of the tomb structure soon gained religious sanctity and came to be
viewed and valorised, in some instances, next to the Kaʿba and the mosque.
Once, while discussing the events before the conquest of Makkah and the
pledge the Prophet took from his followers, Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Din Awliyāʾ
recounted a story he had heard from the Shaikhu’l Islām of Awadh, Shaikh
Rafīʿu’d-Dīn, about one of his relatives who was a disciple of Khwāja Ajal
Shīrāzī. This disciple, when he was about to be beheaded on account of some
suspicion, instead of facing the Qibla (prayer orientation), turned his face
towards the grave of his pīr. Reminded by the executioner of the right direc-
tion of the Qibla (the direction of Kʿaba), the disciple retorted, “Carry on with
your job, I have my face turned towards my Qibla.”9 The grave of a Shaikh and
his dargāh, therefore, is revered by the disciples not merely as a fountainhead
of blessings; the grave takes the place of Kʿaba, the house of Allāh in Makka.
In another discourse, in which Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʿ, with tears in his eyes,
equated his visit to the tomb of his pīr to a visit to Kaʿba itself, plays a quintes-
sential role in developing the psyche of shrine visitation in the South Asian
Sufi milieu. The discourse was incited by an observation made by Ḥasan Sijzi,
on an anecdote narrated by his friend Malīḥ that only a person who has no
pīr should go for Ḥajj. Instead of refuting the statement, Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʿ
recalled an incident in support of it. He recounted that when after the demise
of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn, his desire for performing the Ḥajj overpowered him, he
thought of visiting his Shaikh at Ajodhan. By visiting the Shaikh (shrine), not
only was his purpose achieved, but he gained more (chūṅ ba ziyārat-i Shaikhu’l
Islam rasīdam ān maqsūd marā ḥāṣil shud maʿshaiʾ zāʾid). That extra gain was
that he no longer wished for the Ḥajj pilgrimage.10 Following the same vein,

8 Ashraf Jahāngīr Simnāni. 1499/1999. Laṭāʾif-i Ashrafī fī bayān-i ṭawāʾif-i Sufi. (vol. 1).
Karachi: Ḥalqa-yi Ashrafiya, p. 47.
9 FF, Majlis 16, 6th of Ramaẓān, 710/1310.
10 FF, Majlis 28 of Rabi῾u’l ākhir, 714/1314.
188 Chapter 8

Sayyid Gīsū Darāz is quoted to have said that “when, for good reasons, people
were unable to make the pilgrimage to Mecca, a visit once in their lives to his
mausoleum would convey the same merit.”11
Shaikh Sharafu’d-Dīn Aḥmad Yaḥya Manerī (d. 782/1381) of the Firdawsī
order, in a long letter, exhorts his disciples to visit graveyards (goristān) and
to get into the habit of performing the ziyārat of holy persons and believers as
it has several benefits ( fawāʾid bisyār ast). One such benefit, according to one
Ḥadīth of the Prophet, is that it softens the hearts of the visitors and reminds
them of their own life’s end. While discussing the etiquettes of visiting the
graves and shrines, he emphasised that the visitor should be barefoot, stand
facing the grave, and should offer greetings (salām) to the dead loudly. He illu-
minates the benefits of shrine visitation, particularly on Mondays, Thursdays,
and Fridays. He then explains how prayers should be recited while visiting the
graves.12 Sharafu’d-Dīn Manerī approved of the practice of kissing the graves
of saints and considered it a rewarding act.13 Manerī was convinced that offer-
ing gifts to the shrine and placing food there for the soul of the dead Sufi is an
indicator of the greatness of the saint buried in the shrine.
Shaikh Shahul Hamid of Nagore in Tamil Nadu, three days before his death
in 1570, told his son to visit his grave on the third day following his burial and
offer greetings to the dead saint. If there is a response from the inside the grave,
he (the son) should continue to stay in Nagore, otherwise he could move to
a place of his choice. As there was a response from the grave, the son stayed
in Nagore as directed by his father.14 The same Sufi, Shaikh Shahul Hamid is
reported to have said that for those who cannot afford to go for Ḥajj, seven
visits to his shrine at Nagore would give them the merit of Ḥajj.15

11 Jaʿfar Sharīf, Herklots, G.A., & Crooke, W. 1921. Islam in India, or The Qānūn-i-Islām: The
customs of the musalmāns of India comprising a full and exact account of their various rites
and ceremonies from the moment of birth to the hour of death. London: Curzon Press, p. 210.
12 Letter No. 21 in Sharafu’d-Dīn Aḥmad Ibn-Yaḥyā Manerī, Ibn-Abī-Ṣāliḥ ʿAbd-al-Qādir
al-Gīlānī, and Muḥammad Abū-’l-Ḥasan. 1885. Maktūbāt Ḥaẓrat-i Shaikh Sharaf-ad-Dīn
Yaḥyā Manerī. Lucknow: Munshī Nawal Kishore, pp. 75–80.
13 Sharafu’d-Dīn Ahmad Ibn-Yahya Manerī. 2011. Madanu’l Maʿanī. (Urdu Translation).
Nalanda: Khanqah Balkhia, p. 578. Zain Badr ʿArabī Firdawsī (compiler). 2014. Khwān-i
pur niʿmat.
14 S.A.A. Saheb. 1998. “A ‘Festival of Flags’. Hindu Muslim devotion and the sacralising of
localism at the shrine of Nagore-e-Sharif in Tamil Nadu.” In Embodying charisma: moder-
nity, locality, and performance of emotion in Sufi cults. Edited by Pnina Werbner and
Helene Basu. London: Routledge, pp. 55–76.
15 Jaʿfar Sharīf. 1921. Islam in India or the Qānūn-i-Islām, p. 210.
Sufi Shrines 189

Similar to shrine visitation being an expression of devotion, another prac-

tice that was part of Sufi Shaikhs’ behaviour—and which continues today—
was tying thread or coloured ribbons to the graves of the Sufis. These threads,
shreds of fabric, even locks of hair, are attached to the mesh windows of
the shrines or even to branches of the trees standing in the shrine complex.
Women are chastised for performing this practice which the reformists list
as one of the extra-Islamic rituals. One instance of shrine visitation and the
tying of threads for making vows (mannat) is described in Majlis 77 by Shaikh
Nasir-u’d-din. He recalls the virtues and acts of public benevolence of Sultan
ʿAlāu’d-Dīn Khilji. The Shaikh related that one Friday after the congregational
prayers, he visited the grave of the Sultan out of reverence for him and tied a
thread of his head scarf (dastār) there. That night he dreamt somebody asked
him, “Who tied the thread today and what for?” The Shaikh, in his dream, said
that it was he, but he needs nothing from the Sultan. He said to himself (in the
dream), “for my needs, the rawzā of my Shaikh [Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʿ]
is enough.”16
ʿUrs celebrations, festivities connected with the death of a Shaikh, are occa-
sions for the seekers of Divine Blessings to meet with the dead Sufi masters;
it is also the time of mingling of the elite with the commoners. ʿUrs celebra-
tions, however, remain a great marker creating segregation between the male
and female Sufis. As dates of birth and death of most women Sufis remain
unknown, technically their ʿUrs celebration cannot be held. However, one
major reason of disapproval of ʿUrs celebrations for women Sufis, as I was told
by male attendants of women’s shrines, is that all types of publicity and vis-
ibility for women are not approved. This approval refers to religious approval
as the word used is ḥukm, which is mostly used for religious orders. Those who
oppose it, however, offer no valid reasons to support their arguments. It is this
vague order which results in efforts to deter women devotees from gathering
in large numbers at the shrines of Sufi women. However, instead of stopping
them, it has resulted in their increased visibility at the shrines.
ʿUrs celebrations that include prayers, Qurʾān and darūd recitation, samaʿ,
and free food distribution, lasting for several days and involving large spending,
is a tradition whose proponents are the Sufis themselves. Thus, while Khwajā
Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī was making preparations for a six-day-long ʿurs
of his mentor, Khwāja Nizāmu’d Dīn, he reminisced about the grand celebra-
tions at the ʿurs of Shaikh Saifu’d-Dīn Bākhrāzī of Bukhara (d. 1260) where the
people of the town prepared food in large quantities for free distribution for

16 KM, Majlis,77.
190 Chapter 8

which a large sum of money came from public voluntary donations.17 Khwajā
Naṣīru’d-Dīn kept this tradition by celebrating the ʿurs of Maulānā Burhānu’d
Dīn Gharīb.18 Khwāja Bandā Nawāz, his disciple and khalīfa, celebrated the
ʿurs of all the revered personalities, his mentors and other religious persons,
including his family members, and spent large amounts of money on provid-
ing food.19 Another practice that he was the first to begin was the distribution
of food in honour of the memory of Bībī Fāṭima Sām.20

8.1 Shrine Visitation by Women

This section examines the issue of shrine visitation by women in South Asia.
To an ordinary woman devotee, the shrine embodies the Sufi himself. Stepping
into the sacred space where the Sufi is resting in his/her grave is like having an
audience with a living being, requiring etiquettes that were observed earlier in
the august assemblies of the Shaikh. Thus, like the murīd of the past, the visitor
today, after salutation, in place of kissing and placing his/her forehead at the
feet of the Shaikh would kiss the shrine’s threshold. Similarly, care is always
taken not to turn one’s back towards the shrine but always to step backwards.
I begin this section by giving my translation of an extract from Jahān Ārāʾ
Begum’s Mūnisu’l arwāh, a biographical compendium of early Chishtī Sufis,
which she completed at the age of forty-seven in 1051/1641, describing her
ziyārat of the shrine of Khwāja Muʿīnu’d-Dīn Chishtī in Ajmer.21 The pilgrim-
age journey, accompanied by her father, Emperor Shāh Jahan (d. 1666), started
from Akbarābād (Agra) on 18 Shaʿbān 1053/31 October 1643, towards Ajmer, the
blessed land (khiṭṭā-yi pāk). The pilgrims’ caravan arrived in Ajmer on Friday, 7
Ramaẓān 1643. On her way to the shrine, at each stop (manzil) she would offer
two nafls22 of prayer and recite Sura Yāsīn, Sura Fātiḥā, and Sura Ikhlās for
the reward (sawāb) of Khwāja Muʿīnu’d-Dīn Chishtī’s soul. At the shrine, she
stayed near Ana Sagar. As a mark of full respect for the saint (kamāl-i adab),
throughout her stay she neither reposed nor slept in a bed nor spread her feet
towards the direction of the holy tomb (rawẓā-yi muqaddas) and did not turn

17 KM, Majlis, 93.

18 KM, Majlis, 1.
19 Shāh Muḥammad ʿAlī Sāmānī. 831/1427, Siyar-i Muḥammadī, pp. 76–79; Maulawī
Muḥammad Sulṭān. 1343/1924. Armughān-i Sulṭānī al-maʿrūf sair-i Gulbarga, pp. 84–86.
20 Ibid, p. 82.
21 Jahān Ᾱrāʾ Begum, Mūnisu’l-arwāh. Translated in Urdu as Muʿinu’l-arwah by Maulawī
Muḥammad ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad Kalīm Qādirī. Dehli: Matbāʿ Rizwi, 1891, pp. 43–44.
22 A nafl is a supererogatory prayer and is a type of optional Muslim prayer.
Sufi Shrines 191

her back from the shrine. She spent the daytime under the trees. All this time,
due to the blessings of the Shāh Dīn-i panāh (the king of the faith of refuge,
i.e., Khwāja Muʿīnu’d-Dīn Chishtī) and the āʾīn (rites) of sar zamīn-i jannat (the
grounds of heaven, i.e., the shrine), she had unique spiritual experiences. In
honour of the saint, one evening she organised milād sharīf, an assembly to
celebrate the Prophet’s birthday, and arranged illumination around the area.
She left nothing undone (taqsīr na kī) in serving the rawẓā. On the afternoon
of 14 Ramaẓan, with countless thanks to God, she had the honour of enter-
ing the luminous holy shrine (rawẓā-yi munawwara). She rubbed her face,
which had turned yellow (because of the awe of the saint) with the dust of
the shrine (āsitānā kī khāk) (performed prostration). From the doorway of the
main edifice of the shrine to the threshold of the grave enclosure, she walked
barefoot with her head bowed down touching the ground, kissing the ground
(zamīnbos). Seven times, she walked around the holy grave (qabr-i aṭhar), the
dust of the shrine becoming the collyrium for her eyes. At this moment, what
she experienced was beyond the capacity of words to describe. Intoxicated
(sarāsīmā) by intense yearning, she was confused and did not know what to
do and what to say. With her hands, she anointed the fragrant grave (turbat-i
muʿaṭṭar) perfumed with amber (muʿaṅbar) with ʿiṭr (perfume of rose essence)
and spread on the tomb the sheets of flowers she had carried on her head.
Afterwards, she went to the shrine, built in marble by her father, and offered
prayers in thanksgiving and recited Sura Yāsīn for the soul of the saint. She
sat there until the maghrib prayers. She then lit the candle at the luminous
sepulchre (marqad-i munawwar) and broke her fast by sipping water. What an
evening, far better than a morning! Devotion, and love compelled her not to
depart from such a sacred place; perforce, and grieving a hundred thousand
times she, however, sought permission to depart from this court (bārgāh) with
tearful eyes and a burning heart. Next morning, they left for Akbarābād.23

8.2 Shrines as Spaces for Women’s Expression of Spirituality

Shrine visitation remains a normative practice for most women. Their visits
not only keep the visitors’ traffic alive but also multiplies a shrine’s earnings
through gifts and donations in cash and kind. In addition, and more signifi-
cantly, the shrine provides a space for most women visitors where they can
meditate and sit in some peace, away from everyday life demands. For women,
the shrine space is a safe place for the expression of their spirituality as well

23 Mūnisu’l-arwāh, pp. 43–44.

192 Chapter 8

as their identity and selfhood. Flagrant gender discrimination is on display

at these sacred places, as most shrines carry signposts prohibiting women’s
entry beyond specified areas. This violation of their rights, however, does not
deter women who, in search of the Divine, hang to the mesh doorways of the
shrines, rub their hands on its walls, and gather the dust in their hands to seek
eternal bliss.
In their everyday idiom, women often change the verb ziyārat into a plural
noun (to show their respect for the saint). Thus, instead of “I went to visit,”
she would say “I went for visitations” (main ziyaraton kē līyē ga‌ʾī). Devotees
assume that the saint is present there, watching them and answering their sup-
plications (duʿa). On my visits to the shrines, I watched the devotees as they
entered the shrine and either said “assalam-o-alaikum baba” or would touch
their forehead with their right hand for a salutation to the saint. I observed
several women directly addressing and conversing with the sepulchre of the
saint by holding and kissing the chadar covering the tomb. Another common
way of making supplications, at almost all the shrines, is to say “main hāzir huʾī
hūn” (I submit myself in your presence) or “āp merē liye duʿa kijiye” (please pray
for me).
My first exposure to the so-called shrine culture of Pakistan took place in
early 1997 when I was collecting oral tales of women’s reproductive experi-
ences. Instead of seeking cure and treatment at healthcare facilities, I found,
to my dismay, shrines were the places where women converged to seek solace
and healing. Four years later, in 2001–2002, these tales led to three-country col-
laborative research on women’s reproductive rights. Findings from my second
encounter with shrines in Karachi were amazing. I discovered at least thirty
large to tiny shrines dedicated to the memories of women saints, some bearing
no name or identity. In 2015–2016, for the third time, my field study expanded.
In addition to urban Karachi, suburbs of Karachi, and historic areas—such as
the Makli hills and Thatta in Sindh, Lahore, Multan, and Uchch in the Punjab
and Islamabad and its peripheries—were added to my study area. I also got in
touch with friends and researchers in India who generously assisted in enrich-
ing my findings by visiting some shrines and taking photographs, which they
later emailed me. These visits show how deep-rooted is the trust of women, as
well as men, in the baraka emanating not from remembering or seeking help
from the dead saints, but from the touch of the minutest objects associated
with their shrines. Comparing notes of my encounters with shrine visitors dur-
ing my three separate visits to the shrines, interviews with the attendants at
these shrines, members of the managing committees, and random chit-chats
with others, such as cab drivers who drove me to the shrines, flower, sweetmeat,
or chadar sellers in the nearby shops of the shrines, and even the pedestrians
Sufi Shrines 193

whom I approached to guide me to the locations of the shrines—I find an

astonishing similarity in their responses to my queries and their uninvited
comments.
During my fieldwork, women shrine visitors, some of whom spoke at length
while others shirked me with a sentence or a mere few words, provided me with
great insight into what researchers describe as “mazar culture.”24 A middle-
aged woman at the shrine of a locally known female Sufi in Karachi, the shrine
of Māʾī Mīrāṅ Shāh, when asked what brought her to the shrine, told me, “apni
sunane āʾī huṅ” ([I] have come to tell mine [story]). Surprisingly, although
women devotees are convinced that the dead Sufi can see them, hear them,
and respond to them, they show no signs of hiding their identity as is custom-
arily done in the presence of unrelated men, though they are modestly covered
by large headscarves and chādars. Similarly, a young woman at ʿAbdullah Shāh
Ghāzī shrine, Karachi, told me, “I present myself in his court; what should I beg
for? He knows everything” (inke darbar main hazir hoti hun, mangun kiya, inko
sab khabar hai).25 It is both amazing and saddening to hear almost every one
of them saying, “Where else do we go, who do you think is prepared to hear
our grievances ( faryād)?” The shrine was a refuge for them. What Eickelman
said in the Middle Eastern context, that people find “fraternal certitude and
security,” applies to the case of women’s shrine visitation in Pakistan.26 The
shrine space certainly provides them sisterly certitude and bonding. I found
women, total strangers to each other, crossing borders of ethnic and linguis-
tic frontiers, mingling as friends, and sharing stories of their lives. The shrine
of Mangho Pīr who is the pīr of the crocodiles, and similar to the shrine of
Mirāṅ Datār, Karachi, is linked with the shrine of Baba Gor, the Sidi saint.27
The ʿurs celebrations are held on 17 Shʿabān. Like most other shrines and saints
and mystics, the history of Mangho Pīr is known only through local legends
and songs of the devotees. Burton, in his Scinde or The Unhappy Valley, gave a

24 Katherine Ewing. 1998. “A Majzub and His Mother: The Place of Sainthood on a Family’s
Emotional Memory.” In Embodying Charisma: Modernity, locality, and performance of
emotion in Sufi cults. Edited by Pnina Werbner and Helene Basu. London: Routledge,
pp. 160–83.
25 Desidero Pinto quoted a similar response from a devotee whom he interviewed at the
tomb of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ in Delhi. See Desidero Pinto. 1998.“The Mystery
of the Nizamuddin Dargah.” In Christian Troll (Edited) Muslim Shrines in India: The
Character, History and Significance (pp. 114–20). Oxford University Press, p. 118.
26 D.F. Eickelman.1981. The Middle East: An Anthropological Approach. NJ: Prentice-Hall,
p. 228.
27 Bāvā Gor is the Abyssinian (Habshī) legendry mystic of the Sidi community in Gujrat in
India, where a shrine is dedicated to him, his brother Bābā Habash, and his sister Māʾī
Misrā.
194 Chapter 8

picturesque eyewitness description of a melo (fair) held at the “alligator tank”

of “Mugur Peer” where sacrificial meat was offered to mor Sahib, the biggest
crocodile living in the pond’s water. Burton then mentions the presence of
women who, along with the men folk, perform a dance, “seedy-nautch” (the
dance of the Sidis) to the beat of African drums.28 What Burton observed in the
mid-nineteenth century is recorded in a recent study of similar performances
at the shrine of Bāwa Gor in Gujrat by Helene Basu in her ethnographic study
of the shrine.29 The shrine of Mangho Pir is known for its sulphur water lakes
that heal skin diseases. Most of the devotees interviewed at the shrine were
members of the local community said to have African ancestry.30 Kulsum, a
thirty-five-year-old, never-married woman, relating the legend of the shrine
told me that the tank of the alligators was originally filled with milk. As people
became corrupt, the milk reservoir turned into a water reservoir. Accounting
for her experiences at the shrine, she said, “Here I feel as if the heavy burden
of my heart is lifted off and all the tension melts away. My heart’s desires are
fulfilled.” Her brother, who earlier resisted getting married, is now happily mar-
ried due to the blessings of the pīr. She and several women were not happy at
the males’ attitude towards women visitors of the shrine. “They behave badly,”
women complained.
The saint who lies buried under the earth is believed to hear, respond, and
help. The saint, thus, is alive and not dead. People often turn a deaf ear to the
stories of others, but the saint does not, I was told several times not only in
Karachi but in Lahore, Multan, Thatta, and even in Buner, Swat. The large
and noticeable presence of the poor and the deprived ones at the shrines has
led some researchers to associate the shrines less with Sufism and more with
“miracle-based,” “folk,” or “popular” Islam.31

28 Richard F. Burton. 1851. Scinde or the Unhappy Valley, London: Richard Bentley, pp. 47–54.
29 Helene Basu. 1995. Habshi-Sklaven, Sidi Fakire: Muslimische Heiligenverehrung im westli-
chen Indien. Berlin; Das Arabische buch.
30 John B. Edlessen et al. in their paper, ‘Makranis, the Negroes of West Pakistan’ in Phylon,
vol. 21, No. 2 (1960): 124–30, say that ‘The largest community of Sidis is found in Sindh.
Some years ago, there were 50,000 of them, but that number must have trebled. Although
descendants of Africans are commonly referred to by the name ‘Sidi’ (or Habshi in histori-
cal publications), their social circumstances and cultural practice, including language,
differ greatly in relation to the region of their re-settlement.’
31 David Damrel. 2013. ‘Baraka Besieged: Islamism, Neofundamentalism, and Sacred Space
in South Asia.’ In Muslims and Others in Sacred Space. Edited by Margarett Cormack. New
York: OUP, 2013, pp. 15–39; also, Katherine Pratt Ewing. 1997. Arguing sainthood: moder-
nity, psychoanalysis, and Islam. Durham, NC: Duke University Press; Pnina Werbner. 2003.
Pilgrims of love: the anthropology of a global Sufi cult. Bloomington: Indiana University
Press.
Sufi Shrines 195

8.3 Denouncement of Women’s Shrine Visitation

Although women’s visitation not only adds life and vibrancy to a shrine, it
also adds considerably to the shrine’s income. However, since Ibn Taymiyyah’s
(1263–1328) fierce denouncement of shrine visitations as unlawful and, in reli-
gious matters, equating it to “pre-Islamic idolatry,” religious decrees pronounc-
ing shrine visitation by women as an irreligious act have been on the rise.32
To a certain extent, Ibn Taymiyyah’s influence has led to an anti-shrine stand
which has turned into an anti-women shrine visitation discourse.
Before investigating the viewpoint of the Muslim reformists against shrine
visitation by women, it is important to know that tombs and graves of the
pious and the chaste, despite divisive polemics, have long remained sanctuar-
ies for the seekers of Divine Grace. Once Hujwīrī, caught in some difficulties
(uftād bisyār), spent three months at the tomb of Abū Yazīd Basṭāmi (d. 874),
praying all the time for which he had to perform at least three ablutions per
day, hoping that the issue would be solved. Sadly, it did not happen and the
disappointed Hujwīrī departed towards Khurāsān.33 Hujwīrī, however, did
not favour women’s presence at the places of spiritual importance, including
shrines and hospices.
Shrines often stand, at least in popular estimation, as a gateway leading to
the ablution of sins. As this section moves forward, attestation of this under-
standing of the shrine’s roles by the Sufi Shaikhs emerges. Mirzā Mazhar
Jān-i-Jānāṅ (d. 1195/1781), the Delhi-based Naqshbandī Sufi, told his disciples—
and through them the laypersons—that they should “make the ziyārat (visita-
tion) of the shrines an instrument for blessings of all.”34 Mīrzā Mazhar was
so deeply convinced of the benefits of shrine visitation that he continued to
visit the grave of his murshid, Saiyyid Nūr Muḥammad Badayunī, for the next
six years after his demise to seek his dead Shaikh’s tawajjuh (spiritual atten-
tion) and stopped doing so only when Saiyyid Nūr Muḥammad Badayunī,
in a dream, guided him to seek training not from the graves but from the
living saints.35

32 For a study of Ibn Taymiyyah’s views on reforms, see Alexander Knysh. “The Cult of Saints
and Islamic Reformism in Early Twentieth Century Ḥaḍrmaut. In New Arabian Studies,”
Vol. 4. In New Arabian Studies, Edited by Rex Smith, J.R. Smart and B.R. Pridham. Exeter:
University of Exeter Press, 1997, pp. 139–167; For Ibn Taymiyyah’s influence on south
Asian Islam, see K.A. Nizami. 1990. “The Impact of ibn Taimiyya on South Asia.” Journal of
Islamic Studies. 1 (1): 120–149.
33 Kashf, p. 80.
34 Ghulām ʿAlī Dihlawī. 1983. Maqāmāt-i Mazharī: aḥwāl wa malfūzāt wa maktūbāt-i Ḥazrat
Mīrzā Mazhar Jān-i Jānāṅ Shahīd. Lahore: Urdu Science Board, p. 315.
35 Ibid, p. 265.
196 Chapter 8

The ethos of the people of Delhi when he spoke these words was already
shrine oriented. Nawāb Zu’l-qadr Dargāh Qulī Khān captured this image of the
shrine-going people of Delhi in the years 1739–1741 in his diary, Muraqqāʿ-yi
Dehli (Portfolio of Delhi). On the ʿurs of Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ and of
Khwāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī, men, women, and eunuchs from all the
communities, decked in their fineries, used to encamp around the shrines for
weeks, holding music and dance sessions.36
Similarly, Shāh Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar of Kākorī (1181/1768–1275/1858)37 advo-
cated shrine visitation by men as shrine visits carry many benefits (dar ziyārat-i
qabūr bisyār fawa‌ʾid ast) and therefore many Sufi Shaikhs, considering it a
requirement, have stressed visiting the shrines. Shrine visitation by a woman,
he warned, however, should not be done. The moment she steps out of her
house for visiting a shrine, all the angels of the seven heavens and seven earths
and the souls of the dead curse her until she returns.38
Shrine visitation, particularly by women, gained more popularity during
the eighteenth century. Several reasons could be responsible for this increase.
General social-political chaos that engulfed the Muslim community could be
one of the major factors, followed by slightly relaxed rules for women’s move-
ment in public spaces and the rise of some sort of syncretic traditions. Another
significant reason for a stronger focus on shrine visitation could be that it was
placed on the emerging reformists’ agenda. The Islamic reformist and the
revivalist movements in South Asia, which gained momentum in the eigh-
teenth century, among various moral and social faults of the community tar-
geted shrine visitation, particularly by women, and censured them for causing
the moral decline of the Muslims. Through tracts written on the enforcement
of women’s segregation under male authority, and by the issuance of religious
decrees ( fatāwā) prohibiting women’s presence at the shrines, women’s mobil-
ity was censured and controlled. Subsequently, women’s presence was now
increasingly viewed as a significant cause of social morbidity and moral deca-
dence of the community.

36 Dargāh Qulī Khan. 1926. Muraqqaʿ-yi Dehli, with introduction and Persian text by Hakim
Saiyyid Muzaffar Ḥusain. Hyderabad, Deccan: Taj Press.
37 For the life of Shāh Turāb ʿAli Qalandar, see Ḥāfiz Muḥammad ʿAli Ḥaidar ʿAlawī Kākorwī.
1927. Tazkirā Mashāhīr-i Kākorī. Lucknow: Asḥal maṭāb῾, pp. 75–81; Masʿūd Anwar ʿAlawī
Kākorwi. 1990. Tafsīlāt Mazarāt Ṣāḥibān-i khānqāh Kāzīmiya Kākorī Sharīf: Kutubkhānā
Anwariya.
38 Shāh Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar. 1913. Maṭālib-i Rāshidī. Munshi Nawal Kishore (place not
mentioned), p. 160. [completed in 1257/1841. [A MS of this work is held in the Special
Collections—South East (MSS), Islamic Manuscripts, Princeton University Library].
Sufi Shrines 197

Among several such cases, I would refer to the views of Shāh Muḥammad
Ismāʿīl Shahīd (1781–1831) who was on the vanguard of a tirade launched
against innovations (bidʿat) and in favour of the restoration of Islamic laws
(Sharīʿat) as was done earlier by his grandfather, Shāh Walīullah (1702–1763)
and uncle, Shāh ʿAbdu’l ʿAzīz (1746–1824).39 Ismāʿīl Shahīd used all sorts of
methods of communicating with the masses, including public addresses,
writing of small tracts and pamphlets, and conducting marches across cities
and towns. Surprisingly, his views about women were not in line with Islamic
virtues.40 In his next work, Sirāṭ-i mustaqīm, he denounced devotion for the
saints and their shrines in the strongest terms, equating shrine visitation—by
both men and women—with committing shirk and idolatry practices. He went
to the extent of suggesting the most stringent punishments of various degrees,
including death punishment, against such Sufis whom he called pretenders or
heretic (mulḥidīn-i Sufi shaʿār).41 He particularly warned that women need to
be guarded against the influence of shrines.
One significant move to restrict women from stepping out of their homes
and thus putting a stop to their shrine visitation was taken by Maulānā Ashraf
ʿAlī Thānawī (1864–1943), the author of the celebrated Bihishti Zewar for
women. He issued a fatwa and declared that a person who forces a woman to
stay inside the house and does not let her step out without wearing a cover,
is observing the teachings of the Qurʾān, Ḥadith, and fiqh. Such a person will
be awarded for averting evil and chaos.42 Thānawī’s strictures on women’s
mobility were not new; numerous small tracts had already begun to appear
regimenting women’s mobility to the extent of declaring that a woman who
happens to cast an eye on an unrelated man is committing adultery through
her eyes.43 Thānawī’s voice carried weight as it does even today.

39 For a definition of bidʿat or bidʿa by South Asian Muslim jurists, see Muhammad Khalid
Masud. 1993. ‘The Definition of Bidʿa in the South Asian Fatāwā Literature,’ Annales
Islamologiques, 27: 55–75.
40 Shāh Muḥammad Ismāʿīl Shahīd, 1969. Taqwiyat-ul-īmān. Translated from the original
text by Mīr Shāhamat Ali under the title Support of the Faith. Lahore: Shaikh Muhammad
Ashraf.
41 Saiyyid Aḥmad Shahīd, and Muḥammad Ismāʿīl. 1904. Ṣirāt-i mustaqīm malfūzāt-i
Shāh Saiyyid Aḥmad Barelvī. Dihlī: Matbaʿ-i Mujtabā; Translation of the quoted text is
based on J.R. Colvin’s ‘Notice of the peculiar texts held by the followers of Syed Ahmad,
taken chiefly from the “Sirāt-ul-mustaqīm,” a principal Treatise of that Sect, written by
Moulvī Mohammed Ismail.’ The Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, vol. 1 (January to
December, 1832). Calcutta, pp. 479–498.
42 Maulānā Ashraf ʿAlī Thānawī. 1977. Fatāwā Ashrafiyāh (Kāmil). Karachi: Said Company.
43 Saiyyid Qāsim Qalandarābādi. 1868. Risāla-yi gosha (A tract on veiling). Meerut: Maṭbaʿ-
yi-Qādirī, (an earlier edition came out in 1863).
198 Chapter 8

Another significant voice against shrines and their visitation surprisingly

came from Ṣiddīq Ḥasan Khan Qannaujī (1832–1890), husband of Nawāb Shāh
Jahan Begam, the ruler of Bhopal (r. 1868–1901). Ṣiddīq Hasan Khan was a key
figure of the late nineteenth-century Ahl-i Ḥadith movement which aimed at
religious reform (iṣlaḥ), criticising many religious practises to be “unlawful
innovations” (bidʿāt). Amongst these was the raising of superstructures over
the tombs. Ṣiddīq Hasan, arguing against raising structures over the graves, is
quoted to have said that, more than the graves, superstructures of the graves
tempt the tomb visitors (zāʾir par fitnē ko khenchtī hai). These grandiose struc-
tures motivate reverence for the buried in the heart of the pilgrims and they
develop improper faith (narawā ‘aqīdat) for them.44 The reformist movements
(iṣlāḥī) in the subcontinent gained unprecedented support from the Deobandi
reformists who fought against non-Islamic traditions.45 Women were espe-
cially targeted as promoters of non-Islamic ritualistic practices which thereby
corrupted pristine Islam. Women, thus, were believed to be the main agents of
religious innovations (bidʿat). A small tract in Urdu by Ahmad Razā Khān Fāzil
Barelwī declared that women who visit shrines deserve a curse as this act is not
only makrūh (abominable) but ḥarām (forbidden) under Islam.46
Despite the disapproval and even the large degree of fatāwa against shrines
as promoters of bidʿat, shrine visitation remains popular with women and con-
tinues to be a great source of earning huge income by the shrines’ authori-
ties. The federal and provincial religious affairs ministries of the government
of Pakistan have a separate section for the accounts of revenue earned by the
shrines and for their maintenance and restoration. Thus, while shrine visita-
tion remains a contested issue on several counts, with criticism mostly turned
against women, shrines continue to thrive and expand their influence beyond
faith and spirituality.

8.4 Barricading Women: Veiling and Segregation

Strict enforcement of veiling and segregation for women that requires restric-
tions on women’s visual and audio contact with unrelated men (na maḥram)

44 Shaikh Muḥammad bin Ibrāhīm bin Abul Laṭīf. Qubbe aur Mazarāt ki Tāʿmīr. Lahore:
Darus Salam, (n. d.).
45 The Dāru’l ʿUlūm of Deoband, an all-male-theological school, founded in 1867 in the town
of Deoband, ninety miles northeast of Delhi soon emerged as the key institution fighting
against innovative rituals and beliefs that had entered Islam.
46 Aḥmad Raẓā Khan Fāẓil Barelwī. Jumal al-nūr fī nahī al-nisāʾ min ziyārat al-qubūr:
al-maʿrūf, Mazārāt par ʿaurtoṅ kī ḥāẓirī. Lahore: Shabbir Brothers (n. d.).
Sufi Shrines 199

remains a highly dichotomic issue which becomes more heated when politi-
cised. Late nineteenth-century South Asian Muslim reformists made this
debate further divisive, causing greater repercussions for the community
and for women in particular. The issue of veiling and seclusion, on the one
hand, became a major theme of verbal and textual polemics between the
avid Christian missionaries and the male Muslim protagonists of veiling and
seclusion. On the other hand, this discourse cemented the lines separating
women and public spaces. In between the two warring blocks, the women’s
cause was damaged immensely. Sir William Muir’s characterisation of Muslims
supported by women missionaries turned the issue of Muslim women into
politically charged religious debate by the colonial authors and the Christian
missionaries. Muir observed, without citing the source, that though veiling has
made the Muslim world rude and barbarous, Muslim women themselves are
content with the rules. The Muslim male perception of veiling and seclusion
narrowed further and was employed as an offensive and defensive tool against
the colonial discourse.47 This section, however, briefly presents male Sufis’
appraisal of a woman stepping out of her house as a harbinger of chaos in
society at large.
In the context of women’s initiation in the Sufi silsilas, veiling—or parda, a
more familiar term in South Asia—played a significant role. The Sufi Shaikhs
employed several methods, per the cultural norms of South Asian Muslim soci-
ety, to practice what they viewed as the laws of Islam. One of the basic princi-
ples of Sufism taught to a novice is not to make public their identities as Sufis.
This emphasis on invisibility takes a new meaning when applied to women.
Sufi texts often describe virtuous women as mastūra, which, though it means
a concealed or covered woman, in the Sufi texts it connotes a pious woman.
Concealed women or women who do not show their faces to strangers, or even
avoid all public appearances, are regarded as virtuous. Thus, when Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad prayed for rainfall for relief from draught while
holding the blessed scarf of his pious mother, he supplicated by saying, “My
Lord! Send down rain in honour of the respected woman to whose scarf this
thread belongs and on whom stranger’s gaze never fell upon.”48 Emphasis on
women’s concealment goes even beyond bodily concealment—the female
voice is also included within the rules of ʿaura. The Chishtī Sufi, Khwāja Gisū

47 This stand is best reflected in an episode which describes how Sir Syed enraged by the
manuscript of Sayyid Mumtaz Ali’s Ḥūqūquʾn-niswān, tore it into pieces and threw it in
a dustbin. The book could be published only in 1998, after the death of Sir Syed. See,
Abul Asr Ḥafīz Jalandharī.1935. “Maulawi Saiyyid Mumtāz ʿAlī.” Tahzib-i Niswān, no. 38,
pp. 607–17.
48 AA, p. 280.
200 Chapter 8

Darāz, is reported to have commented, “Good women do not let their voice be
heard by unrelated men (nā maḥram)” when he heard the female voice recit-
ing the Qurʾān coming from inside the grave of Bībī Zulaikha, a Sufi who came
from northern India to Gulbarga. As soon as these words were uttered, the
voice of Bībī Zulaikha stopped.49
One of the contemporaries of Khwāja Gisū Darāz was Saiyyid Muḥammad
Ashraf Jahāngīr Simnānī of Kachawcha, in eastern Uttar Pradesh in North
India (d. 1437). Simnānī, who had visited Khwāja Gisū Darāz in Gulbarga and
spent considerable time there, held similar views on women’s segregation.50
Probably influenced by Khwāja Gisū Darāz’s views on women’s veiling and
his overall estimation of their worth, Simnānī’s discourse on women’s initia-
tion in the Sufi silsilas and on veiling reflects more rigidity. Simnānī not only
discouraged women’s initiation but also considered it contrary to the familiar
Chishtī and the Suhrawardī stand on women’s baiʿat. Instead of baiʿat what
is required for women, in his view, is that they should be advised to remain
veiled. If a woman insists on being initiated, she should be told to remain
veiled, decrees Simnānī. In support of his views, Simnānī quoted a couplet
from Nizami’s (d. 1209) Sikandar-nāma which asserts that seclusion in a home
or buried in a grave is the rightful place for a woman because a woman with
an unveiled face has neither modesty (sharm) nor dignity (shikūh). Indeed,
for Simnānī, a wife’s foremost obligation is to keep her husband pleased and
contented. This modesty, in Simnānī’s estimation, is more important than any
wird wa waẓāʾif (liturgy or recitation).
Veiling and segregation of women has caused the Deobandi scholars and
Sufis to issue several rulings ( fatāwā), which declare that uncovered women
incite chaos among men. Rashīd Aḥmad Gangohī (d. 1905) not only declared
full veiling of women from men as the best protection against chaos in soci-
ety, but also decreed veiling in front of non-Muslim women because “the non-
believing women (kāfirāt) must be viewed as ḥarbiyāt (warring women) as
Hindustan is dāru’l ḥarb (abode of conflicts),” he argued strongly.51 Indeed
Gangohi went to the extent of declaring the presence of unveiled women
in front of their Sufi murshid as ḥarām.52 Regarding one Tradition of the
Prophet—“Beware! Whenever a man contrives to be alone with a woman, they
will inevitably be joined by a third, Satan”—Ashraf ῾Alī Thanawi argued that

49 Armughān-i Sulṭānī, p. 161.

50 Ashraf Jahāngīr Simnānī. 1499/1999. Laṭāʾif-i Ashrafī fī bayān-i ṭawā’if-i Ṣūfī. Karachi:
Ḥalqa-yi Ashrafiyāh Pakistan, p. 330.
51 Gangohī, Mawlānā Rashīd Aḥmad. Fatāwā-i-Rashīdiyya (Kamīl) Fiqh Ḥanafī kā Anmol
Khazīnāh. Karachi: Dāru᾽l Ishā῾at, n. d., p. 594.
52 Ibid, p. 593.
Sufi Shrines 201

“under certain circumstances, it is not entirely unlikely that a master could be

left alone with a female disciple, or at least be figuratively left alone if the only
others present are also women. For this reason, women disciples must always
wear veils before their masters. Very little in the way of spiritual progress can
be expected in the presence of many of our present-day Sufis are certainly in
need of correction.”53
Similar views, but with greater and wider acceptance, on restricting women’s
voices and mobility are projected by the Tablīghī Jamāʿāt, founded by Maulānā
Muḥammad Ilyās (1885–1944). The Tablīghī Jamāʿāt, like the other conserva-
tives, see home as the only domain for women. Maulānā Ilyās, who said that
“God assigned him the work and revealed to him the methods of tablīgh,”54
emphasised that the best role of a Muslim woman is to support and facilitate
men’s work by lessening their burden at home and not to seek roles “indepen-
dent or equal to men.” If women will not follow these rules, they will become
“conduits for Satan.” His followers shared and further projected this interpreta-
tion. Thus, Mayan Jī Muḥammad Ismāʿīl Firuzpurī, maintained that all through
their travels, women must remain under male supervision. Women are not
allowed to deliver speeches and sermons as “a woman’s voice is also needed to
remain concealed like her body.”55 Earlier, Khwāja Ḥasan Nizāmī (1878–1955),
a prolific writer associated with the shrine of Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ,
propagated similar views through his Urdu-language journal for women.56
This undue emphasis on the concealment of women, which is not man-
dated by the Qurʾān or supported by the Traditions of the Prophet, has barred
women from all public contacts, appearances, and participation, including in
the Sufi institutions.
53 Tirmidhi: 2165, Ibn Majah, 2363, Nasāʾi, 10418 vide Thanawi, Ashraf Ali, and Yusuf Talal
DeLorenzo. 2010. A Sufi study of Ḥadīth: Haqiqat al-Tariqa min as-Sunna al-Aniqa. London:
Turath Publishing, p. 133.
54 Muhammad Khalid Masud. 2000. ‘Ideology and Legitimacy.’ In Travellers of Faith: Studies
in the Tablīghī Jamāʿat as a Transnational Islamic Movement for Faith Renewal. Edited by
Muhammad Masud Khalid. Leiden: Brill. pp. 78–118. Note that Masud warns that these
comments are not to be interpreted literally.
55 Miyān Jī Muḥammad Ismāʿīl Firuzpurī. Tablīghī taḥrīk kī aur uske bunyādī uṣūl (The gen-
esis of the Tablīghī Jamaat and its foundational doctrines). Delhi: Rabbāni Book Depot (n.
d.).
56 Khwāja Ḥasan Nizāmī. ‘Tablīgh kī madadgār ʿauraten’ [women who assist the tablīghī
work]. Tablīgh-i Niswān, April (1926): 83–85. 1927; “Editorial.” Tablīgh-i Niswān, 1 (1927):
6–16.
 Part 2
Biographies of Sufi Women

⸪
 Chapter 9

Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period

9.1 Sufi Women of the Tenth Century

(1)
Rābiʿa, the Daughter of Kʿāb
Period: Tenth Century
Place: Balochistan

Known by various names, such as Rābiʿa Balkhi, Rābiʿa al-Quzdārī or Khuzdārī,

and anonymously as a daughter of Kʿāb by Farīdu’d-Dīn ʿAṭṭār (d. 1221) and
ʿAbdur Raḥman Jāmī (d. 1492),1 this tenth-century woman with Sufi yearnings
was also a poet of the Persian and Arabic languages.2 Muḥammad ʿAwfī (d.
sometime after 1233)3 identifies her by her name as Rābiʿa daughter of Kʿab
al-Quzdārī. Claimed by several countries and communities as theirs, much
about the life of Rābiʿa remains elusive to historians.
ʿAwfī, a writer of the late twelfth and early thirteenth century, in his com-
pendium of Persian poets titled Lubābu’l-Albāb, writes this about Rābiʿa: “The
daughter of Kʿāb, although she was a woman, was superior to men in accom-
plishments. She was proficient (qādir) in both Arabic and Persian poetry. She
possessed great intelligence (zaka‌ʾkhāṭir) and sharp temperament (hiddat-i
ṭabʾ). She used to continuously play the game of love and admired beautiful
youths (paiwasta ʿishq bākhti wa shāhidbāzi kardi).”4 Ritter’s response to ʿAwfi’s
last statement is that Rābiʿa was “revered heavenly beauty [as reflected] in
earthly beauty.”5

1 ʿAbdur Raḥman Jāmī (Edited and trans. by W. Nassau Lees). 1858. Nafaḥāt al-uns. Calcutta:
Maṭbaʿ līssī, p. 732.
2 Inʿām ul Ḥaq Kausar.1986. Tazkira Ṣūfiya‌ʾ-yi Balochistan. Lahore: Urdu Science Board,
pp. 102–103; Inʿām ul Ḥaq Kausar.1961. “Rabia Khuzdari a prominent literary figure of medi-
eval Baluchistan.” JPHS, 9 (1): 34–41.
3 Sadīduʿd Din Muḥammad ʿAwfi’ served the courts of the rulers of Samarqand and Bukhara.
He, then, arrived at the court of Nāṣiru’d-Dīn Qabacha of Multan and in 1220 dedicated his
book, Lubābu’l-Albāb to him. From Multan, he journeyed to the court of Sultan Iltutmish in
Delhi and there wrote his well-known work Jawamiʿul-Ḥikayāt in 1228.
4 Sadīduʿd Din Muḥammad ʿAwfi’. The Lubābu’l-Albāb (ḥissa sānī). (Edited by Edward G. Browne
and Mīrzā Muḥammad Qazwīnī) (London: Luzac & Co. 1903), pp. 61–63.
5 Ritter Hellmut, John O’Kane, and Bernd Radtke. 2013. The Ocean of the Soul: Men, the World,
and God in the Stories of Farīd al-Dīn ʿAṭṭār. Leiden: Brill, p. 372; Shāhidbāzī (witness game),

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_011

206 Chapter 9

ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Jāmī (d. 898/1492) is the first and perhaps the only one to
include Rābiʿa’s name in the list of thirty-five female Sufis that he added in
his eleventh-century Persian work, Nafaḥāt al-uns, containing biographical
notices of more than six hundred male Sufis. Although Jāmī’ in his short notice
does not identify Rābiʿa by her name but by the ascription to her father as bint-i
Kʿāb (daughter of Kʿāb), he begins his narrative with this quote from an impor-
tant Sufi master and mystic poet, Shaikh Abū Saʿīd Abu’l Khair (d. 440/1049):
“The daughter of Kʿāb was in love with a slave” (dukhtar-i Kʿāb ʿāshiq būd barān
ghulām).6 Next, Jāmī adds more details of this story as narrated by Shaikh
Abū Saʿīd, saying that one day, unexpectedly, she met with this slave (naghah
daryaft) who pulled on her sleeve (sar-i āstīn wai girift). At this, the daughter of
Kʿāb exclaimed, “I am with the Lord (man ba khudāwand); I have given you the
outer form (bar tū bīrūn dadam) but you now seduce (ṭamʿ) me.” Concluding
the narrative, Jāmī says that Shaikh Abū Saʿīd observed that what this daughter
of Kʿāb spoke are words that no other person could have spoken.7
Farīdu’d-Din ʿAṭṭār in his book of mystical stories of Divine love, Ilāhi
nāmā, in a narrative titled, Ḥikāyat Amīr-i Balkh wa ʿāshiq shudan dukhtar-i
o (the story of the chieftain of Balkh and his daughter’s falling in love), gives
a romantic account of Rābiʿa’s mystical love affair with Bektash, her brother
Ḥaris’s slave, which ended in the tragic death of both Rābiʿa and Bektash. ʿAṭṭār
withholds the name Rābiʿa and says she was called Zainu’l ʿArab (the ornament
of the Arabs). She was so charming that it was next to impossible to describe
her beauty.8 Blois, however, rejects this story of ʿAṭṭār as having “no value as a
biographical source” for Rābiʿa.9
The last part of her name, Quzdārī, has caused some speculation regarding
the historicity of Quzdār. Minorsky identifies Quzdār with the city of Khuzdār

as practised by some Sufis, is contemplating Divine beauty in the faces of the youths. see
Lloyd Ridgeon. 2012. “The controversy of Shaykh Awḥad al-Dīn Kirmānī and Handsome,
Moon-Faced Youths: A Case Study of Shāhid-Bāzi in Medieval Sufism” in Journal of Sufi
Studies, 1 (1): 3–30.
6 Jāmī also gives this story on the authority of Shaikh Abū Saʿīd Abu’l Khair, see Nafaḥāt al-uns,
p. 732.
7 Ibid, p. 732.
8 Farīdaddīn Aṭṭār. Ilahi- Name. Istanbul (Bibliotheca Islamica, 1940), pp. 330–352.
9 Francois de Blois. 2004. Persian Literature—A Bio-Bibliographical Survey. Volume V, Poetry of
the Pre-Mongol Period. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, p. 190.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 207

in Balochistan.10 Ritter’s rejection that her father was an Arab who ruled over
Balkh indirectly supports Rābiʿa’s association with Khuzdār.11
Sunil Sharma’s reading of ʿAwfi’s Lobāb al-albāb is worth mentioning here.
Describing the Lobāb as the first extant tazkira, dating from around 1221, which
lists only one woman poet, “Rābʿea of Qozdār (or Balkh),” Sharma says that
ʿAwfī portrays her “as a boy chasing intelligent woman.” He further comments
that later authors such as ʿAṭṭār and Jāmi “were responsible for converting her
image into that of a mystic poet.” Thus, he concludes that “although the non-
mystical Rābeʿa was integrated into the mainstream tradition of women poets
at an early date, she also occupies a separate place in the canon of Sufi poets,
and the two traditions only come together in the nineteenth century.”12
Today Rābiʿa is commemorated in Balochistan and across Pakistan’s borders
in Afghanistan and Iran by naming several schools, hospitals, and roads after
her. Women claim her as representing their lost voice.13 A film titled Rabia
of Balkh, produced in 1974 in Afghanistan, played not only an important role
in the history of Afghānī cinema, argues Lynes, “but also in the figuration of a
proto-feminist political agency, one that in many respects resembles the ethi-
cal call for justice in Sophocles’s Antigone.”14 Rābiʿa’s shrine in the compound
of the fifteenth-century Naqshbandī Sufi Khwāja Abu Naṣr Pārsa (d. 1240)15 in
Balkh was recently consolidated.16 Women like Rābiʿa al-Quzdārī or Khuzdārī
make research an engagement of utter fascination.

10 Vladimir F. Minorsky. 1937. Ḥudūd al-ʿālam: A Persian Geography; 372 A.H.–982 A.D.—
The regions of the world. London: Luzac; also, Iran Society (Kolkata, India). 1950. Four
Eminent Poetesses of Iran. With a brief survey of Iranian and Indian poetesses of Neo-
Persian. (Rābi′ah of Quzdār.—Mahsatī of Ganja.—Qurratu’l-ʿAyn.—Parvīn-i lʾtisāmī.)
[With portraits and facsimiles.].
11 The Ocean of the Soul: Men, the World, and God in the Stories of Farīd al-Dīn ʿAṭṭār. p. 372.
12 Sunil Sharma. 2009. “From ‘Ā’esha to Nur Jahān: The Shaping of a Classical Persian Poetic
Canon of Women.” Journal of Persianate Studies, 2 (2): 148–16. For the quotes, see p. 151.
13 See for instance The Story of Rabia Balkhi—Afghānī Women’s Writing Project. awwpro-
ject.org/2013/08/the-story-of-rabia-balkhi/.
14 Krista Geneviève Lynes. 2012. Prismatic Media, Transnational Circuits: Feminism in a
Globalized Present. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
15 For the shrine of Khwāja Abu Naṣr, see R.D. McChesney. 2001. “Architecture and Narrative:
The Khwāja Abu Nasr Parsa Shrine. Part 1: Constructing the complex and its meanings.”
Muqarnas, 18 (1): 109–10.
16 Khwaja Parsa Complex Conservation | The colour tiled decorations of … archnet.org/
sites/8513/media_contents/91137.
208 Chapter 9

9.2 Sufi Women of the Twelfth Century

(1)
Bībī Kamāl
Date: B. 1174
Place of birth: Kashghar, Central Asia
Dargāh: Kako, Bihar, India

A scion of a pious family, Makhdūma17 Bībī Kamāl is one of the earliest Sufis
whose shrine in a remote area of Bihar continues to attract devotees today.
Though oral and popular traditions ascribe her birth in Kashghar in about
1174,18 we have no textual evidence to support that.
Cunningham’s archaeological survey report in the late nineteenth century
first introduced Bībī Kamāl to the modern-day audience. The shrine of Bībī
Kamāl along with a mosque is in a small place lying 10 kilometres from the
Jahanabad railway station, between Gaya and Patna, near Phulwari Sharīf on
the banks of a pond called Kunara.19 The place came to be known as Bībīpur,
the abode of the Bībī. Bībī Kamāl is also known as Bībī Pāk Dāman (the
chaste lady).
A few years after the Cunningham survey, ʿAbdu’l Razzāq ʿAṭāʾ Ḥusain’s
Kanzu᾽l-ansāb (Treasures of genealogies) included more information about
Bībī Kamāl. ʿAbdu’l Razzāq ʿAṭāʾ Ḥusain’s valuable work Kanzu᾽l-ansāb, a
repository of the genealogies of the pious and virtuous, provides informa-
tion about persons of excellent faith, considered pillars among the Shaikhs
(nasbnāma buzurgān-i-dīn ʿumdatu’l mashāʾikhīn). Drawing upon an earlier
source, authored by one Shāh Muḥammad Makhdūm Bakhsh Firdawsī, and
narratives collected from the descendants of Bībī Kamāl who were the inhab-
itants of Nauābādah Khurd, Azimabad, and Danapur near Patna, ʿAṭāʾ Ḥusain
sketches the family background of Bībī Kamāl.20
Saiyyid Shāh Ghafūruʾr Raḥman Kākwī, a scion of Bībī Kamāl writing in
1935, added more hagiographical information which is not found in any other
source. Kākwī writes that Bībī Kamāl, seated in a miyanā (a kind of curtained
palanquin) carried by four Muslim kahār (an Indian caste of palanquin carriers)

17 Literal meaning of Makhdūma is ‘one who is served, a master.’ In Sufi terminology,

makhdūma (feminine noun for makhdūm) is an honorific title of a Sufi of high rank.
18 Kako ‘dargah’: beacon of peace and communal harmony …
www.spritualworld.com/2013/11/kako-dargah-beacon-of-peace-and.html.
19 Alexander Cunningham et al. 1966. Archaeological Survey of India: [reports covering the
years, 1862–84]. Delhi: Indological Book House, p. 37.
20 ʿAdu’l Razzāq ʿAṭāʾ Ḥusain. 1302/1884. Kanzu᾽l-ansāb. Bombay: Maṭbaʿ Ṣafdarī, p. 5, 186.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 209

and accompanied by her tutor (ustād) named Shāh Muḥammad Farīd, riding
a horse, a male attendant, Fahīm, and a female attendant, Dāʾī Bīgo, arrived in
Kāko. All her fellow travellers are buried in her shrine complex. The shrine was
first built with unbaked bricks. Sultan Firūz Shāh Tughlaq (r. 1351–1388), during
his visit to Bihar in 759/1358, encamped close to Bībī Kamāl’s shrine and allot-
ted some funds for a permanent structure for the shrine. Kākwī also says that
as the actual date of Bībī Kamāl’s demise is not known, her ʿurs is celebrated on
the last Thursday of Bhadon, the fifth month of the Indian Vikrami calendar,
corresponding to August–September.21
Bībī Kamāl, or Kamālo, her affectionate name in popular memory, was the
granddaughter of Ḥaẓrat Makhdūm Saiyyid Shihābu’d-Dīn (b. 570/1174), the
son of Sulṭān Nāṣiru’d-Dīn of Kashghar, and his wife, Bībī Nūr, daughter of
Saiyyid Wajihu’d-Dīn.22 Following the footsteps of Central Asian Sufis, Shaikh
Shihābu’d-Dīn gave up his position as Qāẓī and worldly assets and chose
the path of faqr. Soon, he became a traveller in the path of spirituality and
arrived in Lahore. Traversing the terrain of northern India, the migrant Sufi
around 600/1203 finally chose to settle in eastern Hindustan in a small rural
area called Jethali in Bihar on the banks of the river Ganga near Bakhtiarpur in
the Patna District. In Bihar, he immersed with the local milieu, as his popular
local epithet Pīr Jug Jot shows.23 A recent book on the Sufis of Bihar says that
Qāẓī Shihābu’d-Dīn came to Bihar at the invitation of Ikhtiyāru’d-Dīn Khaljī
(d. 1206) who, following his conquest of Bengal and Bihar (between 1192 and
1204), needed the services of an accomplished Qāẓī.24 Pīr Jug Jot obtained
khilāfat-nāma from Shaikh Shihābu’d-Dīn Suhrawardī (1154–1191) and is said
to have introduced the Suhrawardī silsila in India.25 Pīr Jug Jot, an august

21 Saiyyid Shāh Ghafūruʾr Raḥman Kākwī. 1986. Āsār-i Kākwī. Patna: Art press, pp. 20–22, 46.
22 Kanzu᾽l Ansāb, p. 68.
23 Jug jot is a local version of a combination of two Hindi words jug, meaning the world, and
jot, local slang for the Sanskrit word jyoti which means light or light of a lamp. Thus, the
title jug jot was conferred to say that Shaikh Shihābu’d-Dīn is the Lamp of the World. See
ʿAbdul Ha‌ʾi ibn Fakhru’ddīn al-Ḥasanī. 1999. al-Iʿlām bi-man fī tārīkh al-Hind min al-a‘lām
al-musammá bi- Nuzhat al-khawāṭir wa-bahjat al-masāmi‘ wa-al-nawāẓir. Bayrūt: Dār Ibn
Ḥazm, vol. 1, p. 63.
24 Saiyyid Shāh Ṭayyab Abdālī. 2003. Tazkira Mashāʾikh-i Bihar. Nalanda: Maktaba Sufiya,
pp. 148–50.
25 See Maksud Ahmad Khan. “Firdausi silsilah during the Sultanate period.” PhD disser-
tation submitted, Centre of Advanced Study, Department of History, Aligarh Muslim
University, Aligarh, 1989, p. 59.
210 Chapter 9

Suhrāwardī Sufi, passed away in 1266 and lies buried in a dargāh known as
Kachchi dargāh (built of unbaked bricks) in Jethali.26
Pīr Jug Jot had four daughters of great virtue and piety who were married
to saintly persons of great sanctity and who belonged to great Sufi traditions.
Of these four, the eldest, Bībī Raẓiā, alias Baŕī Būā,27 “a perfect saint,”28 was
married to Makhdūm Aḥmad Yāhyā Manerī, father of Makhdūm Sharfu’d-Dīn
Yāhyā Manerī.29 The second daughter, Bībī Ḥabībā, also called Jiyya, was mar-
ried to another Sufi, Makhdūm Saiyyid Mūsā Hamadānī, and was the mother
of Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Aḥmad Charmposh.30 The fourth daughter, Bībī Jamāl, was
married to Makhdūm Shāh Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn (d. 1369), son of Saiyyid Ādam Sufi
(d. 1287). She was the mother of Makhdūm Shāh Taimullah Safedbār (d. 1388).31
The third daughter, Bībī Hadyā, was married to Ḥaẓrat Makhdūm Shāh
Sulaimān Langar Zamīn, the grandson of Imām Tāj Faqīh. The couple were
the parents of Bībī Kamāl. Bībī Kamāl was married to Makhdūm Shāh
Ḥassāmu’d-Dīn,32 and together they had two children—a son, Makhdūm
Shāh Ḥusain Gharīb Dhukarposh (dust covered) of Tajpur, Purnea, Bihar
(d. 1490), and a daughter named Bībī Daulat.33 Bībī Daulat was also known
as Bībī Kamāl Sānī (the second Bībī Kamāl) and was a pious person. She lies
buried close to her mother.34

26 Pir Jag Jut’s ancestry is traced to Ḥaẓrat Imām Ja῾far Ṣādiq, the 6th Imām and founder of
the Jaʿfarī school of jurisprudence according to Twelver and Isma’ili Shi’ites. Ibid, p. 68.
27 Baŕī Būā is a word from the local lexicon and means the elder sister.
28 Biographical encyclopaedia of Sufis: South Asia, p. 359.
29 For the spiritual excellence of Bībī Raẓiā, see Manāqibu’l Asfiyā, pp. 130–31.
30 Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Aḥmad Charmposh and his wife Bībī Nabīyah through their two sons,
Makhdūm Saiyyid Tāju’d-Dīn and Makhdūm Saiyyid Shāh Sirāju’d-Dīn left a long line of
Sufis of great excellence. See Kanzu᾽l-ansāb, p. 80.
31 Ibid, p. 68, 80. It is to be noted that both Yaḥyā Manerī and Sulaimān Langar Zamīn were
the paternal grandsons of Imām Tāj Faqīh, who arrived in Bihar from Jerusalem in 1180
and was a direct descendant of the Prophet’s uncle ʿAbdul Muṭṭalib.
32 Urdu sources give varying accounts of Bībī Kamāl’s parental ancestry and about her hus-
band. Thus, Āsār-i Kāko by Saiyyid Shāh Ghafūruʾr Raḥman Kākwī, says that her husband
was Makhdūm Shāh Ḥassāmu’d-Dīn while other sources identify her husband as Langar
Zamīn. See Āsār-i Kāko, 1986. Patna: Art press, pp. 18–20.
33 Kanzu᾽l-ansāb, p. 186. Also, see Karim, Abdul. 1959. Social history of the Muslims in Bengal,
down to AD 1538. Dacca: Asiatic Society of Pakistan, p. 111; Muhammad Ismail identifies
Bībī Hadyā as Bībī Hadda, see ‘Development of Sufism in Bengal.’ PhD dissertation sub-
mitted to the Department of Islamic Studies, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, 1989,
p. 156.ʿIjāzu’l Ḥaqq Quddūsī. 1965. Tazkira-yi Ṣūfiya‌ʾ-yi Bangāl. Lahore: Markazī Urdū
Board, pp. 161–62.
34 Āsār-i Kāko, pp. 49, 51.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 211

Bībī Kamāl, as described by Troll, “established reputation of sanctity”35 and

was one of the “extraordinary or gifted individuals.”36 So deep was her devo-
tion that even marital life and motherhood of two children—a daughter and
a son—did not deter Bībī Kamāl from the path of devotion to Allāh, a life of
piety, and strong tolerance and love for human beings. A legend describes
that once her husband, Makhdūm Shāh Ḥassāmu’d-Dīn, tried to leave her and
walked away at night. Next morning, he found that despite walking the whole
night he was still at her doorstep. It is believed that this happened because of
the miraculous powers of Bībī Kamāl.37
Bībī Kamāl’s legendary history dates back to mythical accounts of gods,
goddesses, and rulers. According to one such legend, described by Beglar, Bībī
Kamāl came to Kāko in the time of Raja Kanak (or Raja Ganesh) and his wife
Rani Hansa.38 The Raja, though Buddhist by faith, served Bībī Kamāl a dish
made of prohibited meat when he invited her to a feast. Knowing by her mirac-
ulous powers what it was, she said, “whatever it is should come out” (Jo hai woh
ho jaye). Soon the food turned into rats, cats, and dogs.39 The city of Kāko, as
the legend goes, turned upside down, burying the Raja under its rubble. This
incident earned her saintly status.40 Bībī Kamāl’s grandson, a son of Makhdūm
Shāh Ḥusain Gharīb Dhukarposh, was killed by Raja Ganesha (1400–1421).41

35 Christian W. Troll. 1982. Islam in India: Studies and Commentaries. New Delhi: Vikas, p. 109.
36 O’Malley, L.S.S. 1906. Bengal District Gazetteer: Gaya. Calcutta: The Bengal Secretariat
Book Depot, p. 77.
37 J.D. Beglar. 1878. Report of a Tour Through the Bengal Provinces of Patna, Gaya, Mongir and
Bhagalpur in 1872–73. Calcutta: Superintendent Government Printing, p. 65; also, William
Crooke. 1891. North Indian Notes and Queries. 1891. Allahabad [etc.]: Pioneer Press [etc.],
pp. 19–21; Alexander Cunningham and H.B.W. Garrick. 1883. Report of Tours in North and
South Bihar, in 1880–8; George Abraham Grierson. 1893. Notes on the District of Gaya.
Calcutta: Printed at the Bengal secretariat Press p. 39; Cunningham, p. 38; O’Malley, L.S.S.
1906. Bengal District Gazetteer: Gaya. p. 79.
38 Alexander Cunningham, et al. Archaeological Survey of India: [reports covering the years,
1862–84]. Delhi: Indological Book House.
39 William Crooke. 1896. The Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India, Vol. 1.
Westminster: Archibald Constable, p. 218; O’Malley, L.S.S. 1919. Bengal District Gazetteer:
Gaya. Patna: Supr. Gov. Pr. Bihar and Orissa, p. 79; Sushil Kumar and Naresh Kumar. 2003.
Encyclopaedia of folklore and folktales of South Asia. New Delhi: Anmol Publications,
pp. 2563–2565; Pranab Chandra Roy Choudhury. 1976. Folklores of Bihar. New Delhi:
National Book Trust, India. p. 98. This legendary story continues till today, see “Dargah
Bibi Kamal” |Indian Female Sufi Saint | An Epitome … https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=6YJ73_RtPRI.
40 O’Malley, 1906, Bengal District Gazetteer: Gaya, p. 79.
41 S.H. Askari. 1956.“The correspondence of two fourteenth-century Sufi saints of Bihar with
the contemporary sovereign of Delhi and Bengal.” Journal of the Bihar Research Society, 42
(2): 177–195; also, see Abdul Karim. 1959, pp. 110–111.
212 Chapter 9

During his visit to Bihar, Prince Khurram, who later ruled as the Mughal
emperor Shāh Jahan (r. 1628–1658), also visited several shrines to pay his
homage and seek the blessings of the Sufis. Munis Faruqui, quoting Shaikh
Kafeel Turabi’s narrative of Khurram’s pilgrimage of the tomb complex of the
thirteenth-century mystic Shaikh Yaḥyā Manerī, writes, “Shaikh Yahya Maneri’s
tomb stood at the centre of an important familial shrine complex in Bihar,
including those of the Shaikh’s father-in-law Shaikh Shihābu’d-Dīn in Jethali
and his sister-in-law Bībī Kamalo in Gaya.” Khurram also made several dona-
tions and endowments for the management of these shrines.42
References to Bībī Kamāl, despite her historicity, are missing in major Sufi
texts. Thus, a woman Sufi becomes a subject of legends and is commemorated
through public memory. Sadly, narratives drawn upon public memory and oral
traditions are considered weak sources in historical research. One such legend
describes Bībī Kamālo’s prophecies as the talk of an eccentric and not as the
conversation of a Sufi who has acquired maʿrifa (gnosis). Cunningham, in sup-
port of his claim which was based on hearsay that Bībī Kamālo was an eccen-
tric, refers to a legendary saying,

Sārā Kako jalgaya

Bibi Kamāl soi rahin

(When the whole of Kāko was burnt to the ground,

Bibi Kamal slept quite sound).43

Beglar, of the Department of Archaeology, Government of India, on his visit to

the brick-built Kāko shrine in 1872–1873, found it in a ruinous state. However,
he found an inscription on a broken piece of a slab, which was hard to decipher
due to its being coated by grime, dust, and oil.44 Beglar does not mention the
name of Bībī Kamāl, only that she was a Sufi saint. Later, Cunningham, in his
report of the tour of Bihar in 1880–1881, recognises the existence of Bībī Kamāl
based on the inscription that was found by Beglar on several brick pieces
lying loose in the courtyard of the mosque in the complex of Bībī Kamāl’s
shrine. Cunningham concludes that her shrine and the adjoining mosque were

42 Munis Daniyal Faruqui. 2012. Princes of the Mughal Empire, 1504–1719. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, p. 212.
43 Alexander Cunningham and H.B.W. Garrick. 1883. Report of Tours in North and South
Bihar, in 1880–81. Calcutta: Office of the Superintendent of Government Printing. p. 38.
44 J.D. Beglar. 1878. Report of a Tour Through the Bengal Provinces of Patna, Gaya, Mongir and
Bhagalpur in 1872–73. Calcutta: Superintendent Government Printing, p. 64.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 213

constructed sometime between 1414 and 1431.45 The inscription also bears
the names of the son and the grandson of Sultan Firūz Shāh Tughlaq (r. 1351–
1388).46 In this report, Cunningham, though he casts doubt about the spiritual
powers of Bībī Kamāl by hinting that she was “half-mad” or “eccentric,” also
included legends and oral tales that he heard about the spiritual healing pow-
ers of Bībī Kamāl. One such incident occurred while he was there. Describing
this miraculous event, he wrote:

On the 4th December 1880, there were about 20 men and women there,
who had come from different places to seek relief. Amongst them was a
girl who was believed to be possessed by an evil spirit. She was the daugh-
ter of an educated Muhammadan, who professed his firm belief in Bībī
Kamālo’s healing powers.47

Devotees continue to come to seek the blessings of Bībī Kamāl even today as
they used to do when it was visited by Francis Buchanan in the early nineteenth
century. Buchanan, who at the orders of the East India Company conducted a
survey of the Presidency of Fort William in 1807, reported five thousand peo-
ple attending the shrine annually.48 O’Malley presents the colonial view of
indigenous devotees of Bībī Kamāl, writing, “The reverence for Kamālo and
Ghazi Miā is akin to the deification of persons who have been approved mira-
cle workers, or who have died in some extraordinary or tragic way. They show
clearly the extent to which the religion of the illiterate Musalmān has been
permeated by the superstitious beliefs of his Hindu neighbours.”49
Today, each Friday crowds of Muslims and Hindus, both men and women,
gather here to make their supplications and are blessed by the miraculous
powers of Bībī Kamāl whom they lovingly also address as Ammā, the mother.
Streams of women devotees come here to supplicate for a child and tie coloured
strips of fabric as they did in the past. Others, similar to the devotees of the past
who sought her blessings to drive away evil spirits, anoint their bodies with the

45 Cunningham, et al. Report of Tours in North and South Bihar, in 1880–81, pp. 37–39.
46 Pranab Chandra Roy Choudhury. 1957. Bihar District Gazetteers. Vol. 3. Patna: Printed by
the Superintendent, Secretariat Press, Bihar, p. 37; also, Qeyamuddin Ahmad. 1973. Corpus
of Arabic & Persian Inscriptions of Bihar (AH 640–1200). Patna: K.P. Jayaswal Research
Institute, p. 49.
47 Report of Tours in North and South Bihar, in 1880–81, p. 39.
48 Francis Buchanan. An Account of the Districts of Bihar and the City of Patna in 1811–1812.
Patna: The Bihar & Orissa Research Society, n. d., p. 249. Buchanan’s statement, however,
is doubtful as he got mixed with the devotees of Bībī Kamāl and those who celebrated the
festival of Ghāzī Miyāṅ.
49 O’Malley. 1906. Bengal District Gazetteer: Gaya, p. 80.
214 Chapter 9

oil of the lamps of the dargāh to get rid of the evil influences.50 Devotees recite
the Qur’ān each day at her shrine. Thus, her dargāh has remained a ziyārat-gāh
for the past several centuries.

(2)
Māʾī Mihirbān
Period: Twelfth Century
Dargāh: Near Fawarā Chawk, Multan, Pakistan

The dargāh of Māʾī Mihirbān, which is in a highly ravaged condition from both
weather and human abuse, is considered an important architectural piece dat-
ing back, according to some archaeologists, to the twelfth century and by oth-
ers to the thirteenth century.51 The tomb of Māʾī Mihirbān (or Meharban) is
under the supervision of the Punjab Auqaf Department, which ascribes the
date of 535/1140 to its construction. On my visit to Multan in February 2016,
I had difficulty in locating the monument. As the taxi drivers were not willing to
drive me to the place, I had to travel in a rickshaw. Upon my arrival, I found the
premises locked. People around the area told me that the gate is opened only
on Thursdays by the officers of the Punjab Archaeology Department at 10 am
and remains open until the Maghrib prayers. Contact with any such office was
unsuccessful. All my efforts at approaching the right person who could allow
me to enter the premises and unlock the door proved futile. The only informa-
tion I could get came from a worker of the Rashid Welders, a cycle repair work-
shop in the neighbourhood, who told me that even pregnant women are not
allowed to enter the shrine as they might be carrying a male foetus.
This brick-built tomb’s crumbling condition attracted the notice of the
Punjab government and UNESCO. In 2013, according to a news article, the
Punjab government approved a release of funds for the restoration of the tomb.
The chief secretary of the Punjab government approved a release of Rs. 69
million for the restoration of historic monuments, including the tomb of Māʾī
Mihirbān.52 I could not get any follow-up about the utilisation of these funds
or any repair work done at the site. This news story, however, gave some

50 Ibid, p. 79; through the courtesy of one of my students, I met with her aged grandmother
in Karachi in 1997, who, though, suffering from a speech impediment, recalled for me
her childhood memories of her visit to Bībī Kamāl’s shrine. Her maternal aunt was taken
there for her mental illness and the family stayed there for about a week.
51 Imtiyāz Ḥusain Shāh. Tazkira Awliyāʾ-yi Multān. Multan: Kutub-Khana Haji Niaz Ahmad.
(n. d.), pp. 217–218.
52 Rs5 million for Mai Mehraban’s tomb—Newspaper—DAWN.COM www.dawn.com/
news/1047274.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 215

information about Māʾī Mihirbān, including that she was the wife of one
Shaikh Ḥasan who came to Multan after the time of Shāh Yusuf Gardezī (d.
1136).

9.3 Sufi Women of the Thirteenth Century

(1)
Bībī Awliyāʾ
Date: D. 655/1257
Place: Delhi, India

Little is known about this illustrious Sufi woman, one of the pious women
(ṣaliḥāt) of the early period of the arrival of Muslims in Delhi. The Sultan of
Delhi, Muḥammad bin Tughlaq (r. 1324–1351) is reported to have had extreme
faith (ʿitiqād-i ʿazīm) in her.53 Our first and only source of information about
Bībī Awliyāʾ is ʿAbdu’l Ḥaqq Muḥaddis Dihlawī. In the concluding pages of his
Akhbāru’l Akhyār fī Asrār al-Abrār (Narratives about the chosen ones), written
between 1588–1591, Muḥaddis Dihlawī included a section titled zikr baʿẓ nisā-i
ṣāliḥāt (an account of a few righteous women) which consists of short narra-
tives of five Delhi-based saintly women. One of these five pious women is Bībī
Awliyāʾ.
Muḥaddis Dihlawī’s four-lined biographical notice of Bībī Awliyāʾ begins
with the statement that she was one of the pious and virtuous women of her
time (az ṣaliḥāt waqt-i-khud būd). He writes that to perform chilla arbaʿīn (forty-
day-long mystic retreat),54 she would go into retreat in her hujra (cell) and lock
herself there for forty days. The only thing she would carry with her inside the
cell were forty dried spice cloves (chihil quranfil). When she came out of the
retreat, people could see that she had eaten only a few of these, while the rest

53 AA, p. 283; Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyya‌ʾ, jild dom, p. 424. Ḥadīqatʾul Awliyāʾ, p. 240; Bahr-e-Zakhkhar,
Vol. 3, p. 365.
54 Chilla arbaʿīn is a mystics’ retreat of forty days of complete seclusion for acts of devotion,
prayer, and remembrance of Allāh by Sufis, mostly under the guidance of their Shaikh.
Hujwīrī traces the origin of this austere tradition in which the practitioner severs all his/
her connections with the profane world to gain nearness to Allāh to the Qur’ān’s verse,
7: 142–143 in which Moses is described to have kept forty days fast and hoped for a vision
of the Divine, Nicholson, p. 324; also see KM, pp. 381–382. Schimmel (1975) has confused
verse 7:142–143 for 7: 138. See Mystical Dimensions of Islam, p. 103. For more on the mystical
practice of chillā arbaʿīn outside Hindustan, see Lloyd Ridgeon. 2002. Persian Metaphysics
and Mysticism: Selected Treatises of ʿAziz Nasafi (Routledge), p. 210.
216 Chapter 9

were still there. As a chilla is practiced with the permission of a Shaikh, we can
therefore assume that a Sufi Shaikh must have guided Bībī Awliyāʾ.
Muḥaddis Dihlawī concludes his brief account by saying that she had a
large number of children of whom some still exist (during his time). All the
daughters were named after her, i.e., Awliyāʾ. Of these descendants, one Shaikh
Aḥmad is described by Muḥaddis Dihlawī as mard-i pukhta (a man with exper-
tise). Shaikh Aḥmad was also a pious man who spent much time in the com-
pany of several masters (mashāʾikh).55
The above narrative, almost verbatim, is found in ʿAbdullah Kheshgī’s
seventeenth-century work, Maʿāriju’l-Wilāyat56 and is repeated in Bahr-e
Zakhkhār written in 1788–1789 by Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf.57 Later, the same
narrative was included in the mid-nineteenth-century Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ
of Shāh Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar58 and in Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyya‌ʾ of Ghulām Sarwar
Lahorī with no further details. Lahorī, however, gives the date of her death as
655/1275 but cites no source for it.59 Although Muḥaddis Dihlawī says that she
was buried outside the qilaʿ-yi ʿAla‌ʾī (the Alai fort of Delhi), her grave is no
longer traceable.

(2)
Bībī Duyā
Period: Thirteenth Century
Place: Quṣūr, Punjab, Pakistan

Bībī Duyā, born of an Afghān father, Shaikh Sulaimān Dāna, and a mother
probably of Rajput origin from Chittor, is one of the most venerated pious
women of Afghān-Pashtūn ancestry, who settled in northern India during
the early days of the Delhi Sultanate.60 Shaikh Sulaiman Dāna was the son of
the most respected Sufi of the Pashtūns, Shaikh Aḥmad Kakbūr Sarwānī (son

55 AA, p. 283.
56 Maʿāriju’l-Wilāyat, fol. 652b.
57 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, Vol. 3, p. 365.
58 Shāh Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar ʿAlawī Kākorwī. 1293/1876. Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ (no name of the
publisher), p. 305.
59 Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyāʾ, jild dom. p. 424.
60 For details of this hagiographical anecdote, see Khwāja Niʿmatu’llah bin Khwāja
Ḥabību’llah al-Harāwi’s Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī, vol. 2, (Dhaka: Asiatic
Society of Pakistan. 1962. Hereafter, referred to as Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i
Afghānī), pp. 782–83. According to this narrative, Makhdūm Shaikh Ṣadru’d-Dīn ʿᾹrif
(d.1286), the son and successor of Shaikh Baha‌ʾu’d-Dīn of Zakarīyya (d.1267), commanded
his disciple, Shaikh Sulaimān Dāna to proceed to Chittor where in the wake of ʿAlāʾud-Dīn
Khilji’s invasion, women and girls will be killed by their men, and to get a young girl of
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 217

of Mūsā Sarwānī), who was a disciple and khalīfa of Shaikhu’l Islām, Shaikh
Baha‌ʾu’d-Dīn Zakarīyya of the Suhrawardī silsila.61
Khwāja Niʿmatu’llah bin Khwāja Ḥabību’llah al-Harāwī’s is the first author
known to have included a separate section on Sufi women in his Tārīkh-i
khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī (History of Khānjahān and a repository of
[knowledge about] the Afghānī), which he completed in 1612 during the age
of the Mughal emperor Jahangir (1605–1627). Under the apt title of “an
account of gnostic and accomplished women (zikr nisāʾ ʿārifāt wāṣilāt) who
have attained the status of spiritual friendship (rutba walāyat) with God and
in revelation, charisma, and miraculous powers (wa dar kashf o karāmat wa
khwariq ʿādāt) have surpassed men of their time (sabqat az maidān-i mardāṅ
rozgār),” this section presents an account of some virtuous and pious women.62
Niʿmatu’llah further observes that although counting the number of such
women is not possible as there are too many, to invoke the blessings he has
made an effort to include an account of some of them.
Among these virtuous Pashtūn women, the first one selected by Niʿmatu’llah
is Bībī Duyā. Extolling her as ʿiṣmat panah (literally, the asylum of chastity;
metaphorically, the most chaste), Niʿmatu’llah writes that this daughter of
Shaikh Sulaimān Dānā and sister of Shaikh Malhī Qattāl possessed shān-i
ʿaīm (esteemed rank) in ʿibādat wa riyāẓat wa mujahidāt (prayers, and ascetic
and spiritual practices). Each day she would fast, and each night she would
pray. Her petitions were heard and answered (by Allāh). Whatever she spoke,
whether good or bad (khair wa sharr), instantly and without any delay (takhal-
luf nabūd) would come true the moment she uttered the words. Several other
strange miracles (khawāriq-i gharībā) are said to have been performed by her.63
ʿAbdullah Kheshgī also confirms that strange miracles (khawāriq-i gharībā)
were said to have been performed by her.64 He adds that Bībī Duyā was mar-
ried to Mahmand, son of Daulatyār.65 A son was born of this marriage.66

extreme beauty from there. He also foretold that this girl would be the mother of his two
sons and one daughter whom he identified as ʿᾹla‌ʾī. This ʿᾹla‌ʾī was Bībī Duyā.
61 On the life of Shaikh Aḥmad Kakbūr Sarwānī, see Abbas Khan Sarwānī. 1974. Tārīkh-i Sher
Shāhī (Translated by Brhamandara Prasad Ambasthya), Patna: K.P. Jayaswal Research
Institute, p. 533; also, Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī, pp. 779–83.
62 Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī, p. 825; Bernhard Dorn. 1936. History of the
Afghānī: Translated from the Persian of Neamat Ullah (London: The Oriental Translation
Committee, 1936), p. 39.
63 Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī, p. 825.
64 Ibid, p. 825.
65 A similar notice on Bībī Duyā is also given by ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī in Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS.
no. R343, fol. 127b.
66 Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī, p. 568.
218 Chapter 9

(3)
Bībī Khadīja
Date: D. 10 Ramaẓān 662/1264
Shrine: Nagaur, India

Bībī Khadīja, a woman of piety, fortitude, and trust in Allāh, is one of the earli-
est examples of women who lived an exemplary life of a devout Sufi during the
early days of Muslim arrival in Hindustan. Married to Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwāli of
Nagaur (570/1174–673/1274),67 a khalīfa of Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī Ajmeri,
she lived as a mentor to her husband, a man following extreme faqr (voluntary
poverty) and zuhd (spiritual piety) with an abiding trust in Allāh. This ascetic
couple, with their totally vegetarian diet, chose to live a hardworking life,
avoiding all fame and worldly attention, in a small rural settlement of Suwāl in
Nagaur. Today, thousands of devotees congregate at their graves. Her husband,
whose prayers and supplications could bring rainfall to relieve of the draught-
suffering populace, remained content with whatever his arid land produced
for himself and his family.68
The key source for knowing the lives of Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwāli and Bībī
Khadīja is the malfūz of Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwāli, Surru’s-Ṣudūr,69 compiled by
their grandson, Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn, who gained so much favour of Sultan
Muḥammad bin Tughlaq (d. 1351) that the Sultan gave his daughter, Bībī Rāstī,
in marriage to him.70 Later on, malfūz and tazkira writers and compilers draw
generously but selectively from this manuscript.
It is said that Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn—who traced his ancestry to Saʿīd bin Zaid,
one of the ten Blessed Companions of the Prophet—was the first child
born to Muslim immigrant families in Delhi and lived a long life, probably
even meeting Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliya‌ʾ.71 Before becoming a disciple of Khwāja

67 The dates of his birth vary. For his biography, see AA, pp. 33–40; MA, pp. 677–83; also,
Bahr-e-Zakhkhar. p. 256; ʿAbdul Ha‌ʾi ibn Fakhru’ddīn al-Ḥasanī. 1999. al-Iʿlām bi-man fī
tārīkh al-Hind min al-a‘lām al-musammá bi- Nuzhat al-khawāṭir wa-bahjat al-masāmi‘
wa-al-nawāẓir. Bayrūt: Dār Ibn Ḥazm, vol. 1, pp. 94–95 (henceforth, referred to as Nuzhat
al-khawāṭir wa-al-nawāẓir); Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 2007. Tārīkh Mashā’ikh-i Chisht ( jild
awwal). Karachi: Oxford University Press, pp. 190–192; B.A. Dar, 1978. “Shaikh Hamidud-Din
of Nagaur—Scholar-Saint of the Thirteenth Century.” Journal of the Research Society of
Pakistan, xv (1): 21–50; Ihtishāmu’l Ḥaqq Farūqī. 1963. Sulṭānu’l-Tārikin. Karachi: Daira
Muʿīnu’l Maʿrif.
68 KM, Majlis 8.
69 The manuscript is in the Habib Ganj Collection, Aligarh, India.
70 Rizvi, vol. 1, p. 130–131; also, see Maksud Ahmad Khan. 1993. ‘Surur-us-Sudur wa Nurul-
Badur’, PIAHC, 54th Session, 1993, Mysore, pp. 231–40.
71 AA, p. 33.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 219

Muʿinu’d-Dīn Ajmeri, Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn (d. 1236), a man of extreme physical

charm ( jamāl bā kamāl), led a life of great frivolity, falling in love with any
woman who happened to attract him.72 Later, following his baiʿat at the hands
of Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī, Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn adopted a life of such extreme
austerity and abstinence that the Khwāja bestowed on him the title of Sultānu’l
tārikīn (the king of anchorites), which soon became his alias.73 Later writers
such as ʿAlī Aṣghar Chishtī, because of Khwāja Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn’s austerity and
spirituality, referred to him by a more august title: Sulṭānu’l mujaddid-i dīn
(king of the rejuvenators of faith).74 Rizvi’s observation that the Shaikh was
deeply influenced by two women—his mother and his wife—without giving
any supporting evidence leaves the reader to wonder what role they had in his
transformation from a lustful youth into a sober Sufi.75
Narratives about these two women, i.e., his mother and his wife, are scanty.
While his mother remains unknown, we have found a few references to his
wife, Bībī Khadīja, a God-fearing person who practiced extreme austerity. Her
life before marriage, her family background, even her age, remain unknown.
She is described as a deeply religious woman who voluntarily chose poverty
( faqr) over a life of comfort. She is mentioned by only a few writers, and even
then, in few sentences in the longer story of her husband; some have not even
referred to her by name. Thus, in his eight-page account of Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn
Suwalī, Muḥaddis Dihlawī (d. 1642–1643), an erudite scholar and meticulous
researcher, skips telling his readers about the virtues of this Sufi woman.
Interestingly, he is the only author who refers to Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī not by
one name, but by several appellations that define his spiritual attainments, i.e.,
-al-Sufi, al-Saʿī dī, and al-Nagauri al-Suwālī, and also gives his genealogy and
place of abode. Avoiding any reference to Bībī Khadīja, not even identifying her
as an anonymous wife, what Muḥaddis Dihlawī writes is that Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn
Suwalī provided food to his children from the produce of a small piece of iḥyāʾ
land, a wasteland, which he tilled with his own hands (bā dast-i-mubārak).76
Muḥaddis Dihlawi’s omission of Bībī Khadīja is hard to explain. He did not
appear to harbour gender bias as he had included valuable short biographical

72 ʿAlī Aṣghar Chishtī. Jawāhir-i Farīdī (Urdu translation by Fazlu’d-Dīn Naqshbandī).

Pakpatan: Maktabā ʿAziz (n. d.), p. 229; for more details, see FF, Majlis 55, 21st of Ziqʿad,
714/1315; Jamālī, pp. 24–25; MA, p. 678; Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf, Ibid, p. 256.
73 AA, p. 33. His teachings emphasizing the path of abstinence and austerity are found in
Surru’s-Sudur, complied by his grandson. See Rizvi, vol. 1, pp. 123–124, 127.
74 JF, p. 229.
75 Rizvi, Vol. 1, p. 127.
76 AA, p. 33; MA, p. 678; Iḥyāʾ, from the Arabic word aḥyāʾ, which among several other mean-
ings also means dead land.
220 Chapter 9

notices of five virtuous women Sufis in a separate section at the end of his
compendium under the heading zikr baʿz nisā-i ṣāliḥāt (An account of a few
righteous women).77
Amīr Khwurd’s (d. 1311–1312) Siyaru᾽l Awliya‌ʾ, the most authentic account of
the lives of the early Sufis of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, provides
details about Bībī Khadīja but keeps her anonymous, identifying her only as
the respected wife (ḥaram muḥtaram) of Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī. According to
this narrative, the couple with their children (whose names are also not given)
lived a contented life of extreme austerity, eating sparsely and sustained by
the products of their small plot of land, which they managed themselves. On
knowing the acute poverty of Hamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī, a local revenue officer
(muqṭāʿ) of Nagaur visited him and offered him some cash and a promise to
grant him an extra piece of agricultural land. The Shaikh refused the offer, say-
ing that he was happy with his poverty as it was not the tradition of his ṭarīqa
(Sufi silsila) to accept gifts from rulers. The local ruler, hearing of the Shaikh’s
refusal, again sent him five hundred silver tankas78 and a royal order ( farmān)
of land grant in his name. This time, the Shaikh waited for a while and thought
of testing the strength of his ascetic wife’s resistance to temptation. To describe
her excellence but without naming her, Amīr Khwurd defines her in superla-
tive terms as Shāh-i zanān (a king among women). Amīr Khwurd pens a pic-
ture of Bībī Khadīja at the time when her husband approached her with this
royal proposal. Her headscarf was so much tattered and threadbare that she
could not cover her head with it and instead had to use the skirt of her dress to
cover her head. Even the fūṭā79 of the Shaikh was torn and could hardly cover
his lower limbs (satr-i ʿaurat). Despite such obvious acute poverty, Bībī Khadīja
was not lured by the comforts the offer promised. Amīr Khwurd writes that
this pious lady, sher-i zan (a lion in the form of a woman), instead of falling for
worldly gains and comforts, questioned her husband’s preparedness to waste
his faqr, lured by the royal offer. She then in one single sentence, as quoted by
Amīr Khwurd, summed up her philosophy of life: “Rest assured, I have spun

77 Ibid, pp. 280–83.

78 In the early fourteenth century, a trooper with one horse received 234 silver tankas per
annum as his salary. Each tanka had great purchasing power. For further details, see
Simon Digby. 1982. ‘The Currency System.’ In The Cambridge Economic History of India,
1200–1750, vol. 1. Edited by Tapan R. Chaudhri and Irfan Habib. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 93–101.
79 fūṭā is somewhat like a tahband, a piece of fabric wrapped and tied around the body, from
the abdomen down to the legs by men.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 221

yarn enough for making a scarf [for myself] and a wrap for you.” These words of
his wife, fakhr-i zanān (the glory of women), led the Shaikh to reject the offer.80
The most revealing information about Bībī Khadīja that establishes her cre-
dentials as a Sufi par excellence comes almost two and a half centuries after her
death when Ḥāmid bin Faẓlu’llah, known as Dervish Jamālī Kamboh Dihlawī
(d. 1536), wrote between 1530–1536 his Siyaru’l ʿĀrifīn (biographies of the gnos-
tics), a highly reliable source on the lives of the South Asian Sufis. Jamālī men-
tions her by her name, Khadīja, and writes that in her zuhd (renunciation) and
warʿ (abstinence from anything doubtful) she was the Rābiʿa of her times. He
further writes that once a week she used to break her fast by eating vegetables
(baʿd az haftāh barg-i nam iftar yak bar mi namud).81 Bībī Khadīja and her hus-
band, Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī, were total vegetarians and survived on vegetables
that they grew themselves in Suwāl, Nagaur. The couple lived a life of Sufi
anonymity and believed that miraculous powers should not be made public.
Bībī Khadīja’s mystical qualities attracted the attention of Lucknow-based Sufi
scribe Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf. Paying tribute to her noble life, he notes in Bahr-e
Zakhkhar (The rising ocean), a biographical compendium of Sufis composed
around 1788–1789, that in poverty, trust, and Divine love, she was the Rābʿiā of
her time (dar faqr wa tawakkul wa ʿishq-i ilāhi Rābʿiā daurān būd).82
Bībī Khadīja and Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī raised their family with honest
and hard labour without falling into worldly temptations. Perhaps they had
no daughter. Their son ʿAzīzu’d-Dīn passed away in 681/1281 while listening to
Samaʿ during his father’s lifetime.83 The couple’s grandson lived a long life and
compiled Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwālī’s discourses.
The manner in which Bībī Khadīja’s life is inscribed by medieval malfūz and
tazkira authors mirrors at best the genre of selective historiography. The male
scribe focussed on the male Sufi and kept the Sufi woman veiled. Bībī Khadīja’s
grave, along with that of her son, Shaikh ʿAzīzu’d-Dīn (d. 676), flank the tomb
of Khwāja Hamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī. Her tombstone gives the date of her demise
as 10th of Ramaẓan, 662. Today, the shrines of Khwāja Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī
and Bībī Khadīja, built in marble and profusely lighted, present a picture far
different from the life that these two friends of Allāh spent in Suwāl in total
renunciation from worldly attachments. The shrine’s popularity reminds one

80 SA, p. 157.
81 Jamālī, p. 25; SA, pp. 156–57. Also see ʿAbduʾr Raḥmān Chishtī (Edited and translated by
Wāḥid Bakhsh Siyāl). 1982. Mirātu’l asrār: qadīm wa ghair maṭbūʿa tazkira-i Ṣūfiyya kā
awwālīn Urdū tarjuma. Lahore: Sufī Foundation, pp. 677–83. (Henceforth, referred to as
Mirātu’l asrār). Mirātu’l asrār also gives her name as Bībī Khadīja, p. 678.
82 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, p. 256.
83 Khazīnatu’l aṣfiyyāʾ. p. 152.
222 Chapter 9

of what Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ recalled about Khwāja Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn

Suwālī’s philosophy: “One who keeps himself veiled while alive, his name,
with all his infinite virtues, spreads all through the world after his demise” (dar
ḥālat ḥayāt khud ra poshīda dāshta ast, bāʿd az wafāt nām waṣiyat-i o bahmah
jahāṅ m-īrasd).84 Surprisingly, Syed Abdul Hayy Nadwi al-Hasani (d. 1999), in
his monumental biographical dictionary of five thousand Indian scholars and
Sufis, compiled in Arabic language, does not mention Bībī Khadīja in his notice
on Khwāja Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī.85

(4)
Bībī Rānī
Period: Thirteenth Century
Place: Ajodhan and Delhi

Bībī Rānī,86 the paternal grandmother of Amīr Khwurd,87 author of Siyaru’l

Awliyāʾ,88 composed between 752 and 790 (1351–1382), was witness to some
of the most important events of the formative period of the Muslim society
of South Asia in the thirteenth century. Amīr Khwurd’s few sentences about
his grandmother, composed not with the intention of writing about her but
being incidental in the context of some other persons and events, reveal a little
bit of her life. With the help of these disconnected and sparse statements, we
develop a sketch of her life in which significant details, such as the date of
her birth and death, remain elusive. These sketchy details, however, are not
without significance for the purpose of this work and for the understanding of
women’s status in the Sufi circles of South Asia.
Bībī Rānī’s sādāt family (descendants of the Prophet’s family through his
daughter Bībī Faṭima) originally hailed from Kirmān where they owned large
properties and land. Her father, Saiyyid Aḥmad Kirmānī, came from Kirmān
and settled in Multan where he held an important position in the depart-
ment of mint. Saiyyid Aḥmad Kirmānī’s cousin, Saiyyid Muḥammad Maḥmūd
Kirmānī (d. 749/1348), used to visit Lahore in connection with his business, and

84 FF, Assembly 1 of Shaʿbān 3, 707/January 28, 1308.

85 Nuzhat al-khawāṭir vol. 1, pp. 94–95.
86 Rānī is a word of Prakrit origin (see Platts, p. 584) which means a queen or the wife of a
ruler (rāja). It is interesting to note that a thirteenth-century emigrant Muslim family
from Kirman chose to have a local name for their daughter.
87 His full name was Saiyyid Muḥammad bin Mubarak al-Alawī Kirmānī, known as Amīr or
Amīr Khwurd.
88 Siyaru’l Awliyāʾ, biographies of the Chishtī saints, is the most authentic contemporary
account of Delhi, its environs-cultural, political and spiritual.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 223

on his return journey to Kirmān, he would always spend some time in Ajodhan89
where he developed strong spiritual respect for Shaikh Farīdu’d-Din Masʿūd
Ganj-i Shakkar (d. 1265). On one such visit, Saiyyid Aḥmad Kirmānī gave his
daughter Bībī Rānī in marriage to his cousin, Saiyyid Muḥammad Maḥmūd
Kirmānī. Saiyyid Muḥammad Maḥmūd Kirmānī along with his wife, Bībī Rānī,
and his followers settled in Ajodhan. The couple, forsaking all the luxuries and
comforts of the world and their home (bā ikhtiyār tark asbāb o imlāk o waṭan-
i-qadīm dād), settled into a self-chosen life of poverty and indigence ( faqr o
fāqā), became disciples of Shaikh Farīd, and served at his khānqāh for almost
eighteen years as his humble disciple. Saiyyid Muḥammad Maḥmūd Kirmānī,
despite his august lineage as the descendant of the Prophet, collected fire-
wood for the kitchen of Shaikh Farīd’s hospice. Amīr Khwurd writes that when
Shaikh Shayūkhu’lʿĀlam (Bābā Farīd) saw his grandfather’s soft (nāzuk) hands
injured (majrūḥ) with thorns, he commented that there was no need (ḥājit
nīst) for him to collect wood as he (Bābā Farīd) had already accepted him as
his disciple.90 Here in Ajodhan, four sons—Saiyyid Muḥammad Nūru’d-Dīn
Mubārak (d. 749), Saiyyid Kamālu’d-Dīn Aḥmad (d. 728), Saiyyid Quṭbu’d-Dīn
Ḥusain (d. 752), and Saiyyid Khāmosh (d. 732)—were born to the couple.91
Bībī Rānī, like her husband, served her Shaikh with utmost humility.
Siyaru’l awliyāʾ gives a glimpse of how she used to serve even wayfarers in the
jamāʿat khāna of the Shaikh. The circle of the inmates of the jamāʿat khāna
included luminaries of the period, such as Maulānā Badru’d-Dīn Isḥāq, the
closest disciple92 and khalīfa of Bābā Farīd who was also the husband of his
daughter, Bībī Fāṭima. Amīr Khwurd narrates what he heard from his father,
Saiyyid Mubārak Muḥammad Kirmānī, that remembering Allāh, Mawlānā
Badru’d-Din Isḥāq’s eyes always remained filled with tears. He cried so much
that his eyes got black circles. Seeing this, Bībī Rānī got concerned that this
constant weeping might harm his eyesight. Addressing Maulānā Badru’d-Dīn
Isḥāq as aye birādar (Oh brother), she said that if he could stop for a moment
(sāʿat), she could attempt to cure his eyes by applying antimony (surmā) to his
eyes. To this, Maulānā Badru’d-Dīn Isḥāq responded by saying, “O my Sister!
(aye khwāhar-i man) I have no control over my tears.”93 In this incident, what
is striking is that Bībī Rānī, unrelated to Maulānā Badru’d-Dīn Isḥāq and thus
nā- maḥram to her, not only closely watched his eyes but was prepared to apply

89 Modern-day Pakpattan, called Pakpattan Sharīf in honour of Bābā Farīd, is located in

Punjab, Pakistan.
90 SA, pp. 208–209.
91 SA, p. 210.
92 FF, Majlis 25 Jamādīu’l-awwal, 709/1309.
93 SA, p. 171.
224 Chapter 9

antimony to his eyes, which required close proximity. Also, it is significant to

note that the Maulānā refused her offer not because she was unrelated to him
but only because antimony was not the cure for his weeping.
One other incident, which occurred when the young Nizāmu’d-Dīn (the
future Sulṭānu’l Mashāʾīkh) arrived in Ajodhan, demonstrates the humility of
Bībī Rānī and the love and care she had for others. Amīr Khwurd’s excellent
penmanship almost creates a visual of this event, bringing out the tenderness
of Bībī Rānī’s heart and the trust in God (tawakkul) that the twenty-year-old
sālik (Sufi neophyte), i.e., Nizāmu’d-Dīn, had. When Nizāmu’d-Dīn presented
himself before the ninety-year-old Shaikh in Ajodhan,94his clothes were
extremely soiled (bā ghāyat rimgīn shudābūd) and he could not wash them as
he had no detergent. Bībī Rānī seeing this condition, said to him, “My brother!
Your clothes are too soiled and are torn as well. If you give them to me, I would
wash and mend them for you.” Though he was not willing and made excuses
(bā zubān-i- karm ma‌ʾzirat mikard), Bībī Rānī insisted, handing him her own
sheet (chādar-i-khud) to wrap around himself as had had no other clothes to
wear. Nizāmu’d-Dīn had no option left and retired to a corner with a book and
busied himself in reading it (bā muṭālaʿ āṅ masghūl gasht). When the clothes
were washed ( jamāhā shustā shud) and were dry, Bībī Rānī asked for the tur-
ban (dastārcha) of her husband, Saiyyid Muḥammad Kirmānī, tore a piece of
fabric from it, washed it, and patched (paiwandkard) the shirt near the collar
(girībān) where it was torn.95 The above narrative is significant as it shows that
women and men, not related by blood ties, interacted with each other and that
women remained unveiled in front of them.
In another incident, on the occasion of the passing away of Shaikh Farīdu’d-
Dīn (Muḥarram 5, 664/ October 17, 1265) and who in the real sense was what
Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn had said about the role of spiritual mentors—bride-
dresser of disciples (pīr mashshāṭa murīd bāshad)—there was no fabric avail-
able for his shroud. Saiyyid Muḥammad Kirmānī hastily went inside his house
and asked Bībī Rānī to find a sheet (chādar). Bībī Rānī immediately handed
over a new white sheet (chādar-i nau sapaid) to spread over the coffin of the
exalted Shaikh.96 Thus, Bībī Rānī was blessed and privileged by the Shaikh to
provide a piece of cloth for his coffin.
Later, when Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn settled in Delhi, he lived in a house which
was also shared by Bībī Rānī and her family. The house had three stories, the

94 Khalīq Ahmad Nizami. 1985. Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ. Delhi: National Book Trust,
pp. 41–45.
95 SA, p. 115.
96 SA, p. 89.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 225

middle one being the residence of the Shaikh, while the ground floor housed
Bībī Rānī’s family. She used to prepare meals for the Shaikh to break his fast.97
Thus, Bībī Rānī and her husband, Saiyyid Muḥammad Kirmānī, had chosen
the path of service to humankind by giving up all worldly desires. Bībī Rānī,
whom Nizami rightfully describes as a “lady with fervent piety,”98 is one of the
earliest women who formally entered into a Sufi silsila and became a disciple
of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn by taking an oath of allegiance. In her everyday life she
played multiple roles of being a devout wife, a caring mother, and as a woman
of piety, virtue, and patience who voluntarily served the male Sufis. The above
anecdotes show that she had interactions with men unrelated to her, in full
view of each other, without veiling her face.
In summation, the story of Bībī Rānī, despite the fact that the major source
of information about her is her grandson, remains incomplete. She appears
in the main narrative as a prop for male characters. While Amīr Khwurd has
recorded dates of major events, of births and deaths of all his relatives and of
the Sufis, surprisingly he skipped this for his own grandmother. Was this deci-
sion deliberate or mere forgetfulness? The answers are almost impossible to
find now.

(5)
Zachchā Bībī
Period: Thirteenth Century
Shrine: Gulbarga, India

Although we have no details about the life of Zachchā Bībī, we have on record
one prominent individual—a Sufi Shaikh—paying tribute to her shrine. This
visit took place sometime in 803/1400. An incidental reference to Zachchā
Bībī’s shrine in Armughān-i Sulṭānī helps us to establish with some certainty
her historicity. Armughān-i Sulṭānī mentions that when Khwāja Gīsū Darāz
arrived in the Deccan from Delhi, he agreed to settle down in Gulbarga at
the invitation of Sultan Tāju’d-Dīn Firūz Shāh Bahmanī (1397–1422), the ruler
of Gulbarga. On his way from Daulatabad to Gulbarga, Khwāja Gisū Darāz
stopped to visit several Sufi shrines and to pay homage and make cash offer-
ings. When he arrived near the fortification of the city of Gulbarga, he stopped
at the shrine of Zachchā Bībī. After performing the ziyārat, the Khwāja placed
one jītal near the grave as an offering before proceeding to the rauzā of Shaikh

97 SA, p. 118.
98 Khaliq Aḥmad Nizami. 1973. The Life and Times of Shaikh Faridud-Din Ganj-i-Shakkar.
Delhi: Idara-i-Adbiyat-i-Delli, p. 47.
226 Chapter 9

Sirāju’d-Dīn Junaidī.99 Two facts emerge from this brief note: first, that the
shrine already existed before the arrival of Saiyyid Gisū Darāz in the Deccan
in 803/1400, and second, that Zachchā Bībī was a Sufi whose virtues merited a
visit from a male Sufi of the stature of Khwāja Gisū Darāz.

9.4 Sufi Women of the Fourteenth Century

(1)
Bībī ʿĀʾisha
Period: Fourteenth Century
Place: Khuldabad, Maharashtra, India
Shrine: Khuldabad, Maharashtra, India
ʿUrs: 7 Shaʿbān

The life account of Bībī ʿĀʾisha, assumed to be one of the widowed daughters of
Bābā Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar (1175 or 1176–1265), still awaits more research
to establish her historicity. Her life history, though brief, has all the elements of
a mesmerising tale of Sufi mystical adventures. Briefly, Bībī ʿĀʾisha travelled at
some unrecorded time from north India, probably from Multan or Delhi, to the
far-off Deccan. What we know through several sources, which are almost ver-
batim copies or paraphrases of the original source, reveals only one episode of
her life. Let us first look at what these sources have to say about her and about
her unnamed daughter, though it is actually her story.
The narrative under the above heading is actually not about Bībī ʿĀʾisha; it
is about her anonymous fourteen-year-old daughter, who was so immersed in
her devotion to Allāh that getting married—a dream of most girls her age—
was not her choice for living a meaningful life. However, she got married under
miraculous circumstances to a friend of Allāh, experienced a miraculous preg-
nancy, gave birth to a friend of Allāh, and retired from marital responsibilities
soon after with consultation and approval of her husband. The story, named
as the story of Bībī ʿĀʾisha, is a prime example of what prompts the process of
writing history, how historical narratives are read, and how they are eventually
presented in modern works for the current comprehension of history. For the
sake of quick recognition of its contents, tallying with its hitherto known ver-
sions, I have placed the narrative under Bībī ʿĀʾisha’s name.
This story, like so many other narratives of Sufi women, has come to us
through a chain of male perception of history. The first and primary source about

99 Armughān-i Sulṭānī, p. 47.

Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 227

Bībī ʿĀʾisha is Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ (bulletin of Sufis), a Dakani manuscript composed

sometime in 1030/1620 by an anonymous author as a hagiographical account
of Sufis of Burhanpur.100 No other contemporary or near contemporary text
says anything about her. The Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ story is narrated first and primarily
to illustrate Ḥaẓrat Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb’s (d. 738/1337) devotion towards his
spiritual mentor, Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, and not as the life account of
pious women.101 According to this narrative, at the time of assigning the spiri-
tual domain of the Deccan to Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb, Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ
counselled him to follow five instructions. Of these the last one said, “Do not
remain neglectful (ghāfil) of serving and protecting (khidmat aur khabargīrī)
the daughter of my Shaikh (meri pīrzādī).”102 Second, this narrative is more an
account of the charismatic powers of one male Sufi (Ḥaẓrat Burhānu’d-Dīn
Gharīb) who foretold the birth of another male Sufi (Saiyyid ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn) by
arranging the marriage of Bībī ʿĀʾisha’s anonymous daughter in miraculous
ways, and less as the story of Bībī ʿĀʾisha or of her daughter who remains anon-
ymous in the narrative. The reason for the story remaining hidden could be
that the narrative was part of a manuscript that remained unknown to readers,
or one could also surmise that tales about women mattered less. The anecdote
became visible to Urdu readers by Rawẓat’l-aqṭāb al-maʿarūf ba mazhar-i Āṣafi,
written in 1326/1908 by Rawnaq ʿAlī, a painstaking researcher of biographies of
Sufis of the Deccan. Rawnaq ʿAlī, a schoolteacher by profession and researcher
by passion, on his arrival in the Deccan from his ancestral home in north India,
scanned all the available printed and manuscript sources for compiling his
work Rawẓat’l-aqṭāb (the garden of the quṭbs). He says that in no other work,
except Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ, did he find any mention of Bībī ʿĀʾisha. For the audi-
ences of Sufi texts in the English language, Carl Ernst also included this story,

100 I have not examined Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ and all my information comes from Rawnaq ʿAlī’s
Rawẓatu’l-Aqṭāb al-ma‘arūf ba maẓhar-i Āṣafi. (Awrangābād: MaṭbaʿMuʿin-i Dakan,
1908 (also published by the Dilgudāz Press, Lucknow in 1931 (henceforth, referred to as
Rawẓatu’l al-Aqṭāb). Other scholars, such as Bashīruddīn Aḥmad. 1915. Wāqiʿāt-i Dāru’l
Ḥukūmat-i Dihlī (ḥiṣṣā duʾm) (Reprint Urdu Academy, Delhi, 1990). Henceforth, referred
to as Wāqiʿāt-i Dāru’l Ḥukūmat-i Dihlī (ḥiṣṣā duʾm) has drawn upon Rawẓatu’l-Aqṭāb, and
Eternal Garden: Mysticism, History, and Politics at a South Asian Sufi Center of Carl W. Ernst.
(Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992). Ernst has based his narrative respec-
tively on Rawẓatu’l-Aqṭāb and the Persian manuscript of Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ kept in the cus-
tody of Khuldabad Shrine Committee.
101 In the list of twenty-six biographies of Sufis, not a single woman’s name appears in
Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ. See Eternal Garden, p. 209 & f. n. 66 on p. 334.
102 Rawẓatu’l-Aqṭāb, p. 120; Waḥīda Nasīm, however, without citing any evidence, writes that
this episode happened in Delhi and not in the Deccan. See, Waḥīda Nasīm. Shahān-i be
tāj. Karachi: Karachi: Ghazanfar Academy (1988), p. 52.
228 Chapter 9

as the story of Bībī ʿĀʾisha, in his work Eternal Garden: Mysticism, History, and
Politics at a South Asian Sufi Center. Following is a translation of the main story
from the Urdu passage in Rawẓat’l-aqṭāb, the details of which support my argu-
ment that it is the story of the anonymous young awliyāʾ Allāh whose identity
remains hidden in all references. Indeed, friends of Allāh neither seek worldly
recognition nor need any certification.

When Ḥaẓrat Burhānu’d-Dīn arrived in Daulatabad, considering it his

mandatory duty because of the orders (ḥukm) of the Shaikh, he used
to present himself in the service of pīrzādi ṣāḥiba (the daughter of the
pir) [Bībī ʿĀʾisha] after each Friday prayer. Imagining Bībī Ṣ̣ āḥiba as Bābā
Ṣāḥib [Bābā Farīd], he used to serve her as he would serve him, and thus
always remained informed of her needs.
Bībī Ṣāḥiba had a fourteen-year-old daughter, adorned with chastity
and virtues (῾iffat aur ʿīṣmat se perāsta) and with devotion and piety
(ṣalāḥ o taqwā se ārāsta), fasting continually and offering nightly obliga-
tory prayers (sāʾimu’d-Dahar aur qāʾimu’l-lail) who always kept herself
cloaked in black robes.
On one of his usual Friday visits, Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb’s glance fell
upon her and he smiled. The mother, i.e., Bībī ʿĀiʾsha, watched this with
disapproval and at once asked [Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb] in her Multāni
dialect why was he gazing at her daughter. At this, Burhānu’d-Dīn was
shaken (badan main larzā paŕ gaya) and with great humility said, “how
could I dare to look at her or smile at her with any other purpose as Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn is a servant (khādim) of your blessed dignified threshold
( janāb ki dargāh falak pā-i-gāh) and I am his [Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn]
lowly servant (adnā ghulām). You are also my makhdūma muḥtarma
(respected Master). I have received the good tidings (bashārat) that a walī
would be born of her. The reason of my smile is that in the blessed belly
(shikm-i mubārak) of the Bībī Ṣāḥiba there is a walī who is saluting me.
However, what amazes me is how would this walī manifest himself from
the belly into this world, as the Bībī has no intention to get married. It
might be that he [the baby] possesses the attributes of ʿĪsā (Jesus Christ)
and would born without a father.
At this, the Bībī Ṣāḥib got perplexed more than the Ḥaẓrat Ṣāḥib was.
Astonished at this, the Bībī asked Burhānu’d-Dīn to perform istikhārā103 to
find whether her daughter was fated to have a husband or not. The Shaikh

103 To look into the Qurʾān for a good augury.

Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 229

promised to return next Friday [with news regarding marriage]. The

daughter also said that she would also do istikhārā that night and would
provide an answer. Next day, after the morning prayer, she described to
her mother the looks of a certain man of good ancestry who would soon
be there to marry her. This is what happened exactly. This man, along
with his attendants, arrived and made a proposal for marriage.
The Bībī Ṣāḥiba sent a worn-out floor mat (kuhnā boriyā) for them to
sit on with a message to wait for a while. In the meantime, Bībī ʿĀʾisha
sent someone to fetch Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb to whom she explained the
whole situation. With his power of intuition ( firāsat-i-bāṭinī), the Ḥaẓrat
at once recognised the person as the one about whom he had the revela-
tion. After greetings, he made them sit with honour and respect and went
inside to ask the Bībī Ṣāḥib to fix the time for marriage.
Now, because of Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s abstinence, caution, and trust in Allāh
(zuhud, ittiqāʾ aur tawakkul), there was nothing in the house except the
old matting that was sent out and no other clothes than the ones the
mother and the daughter were wearing. Therefore, the Bībī Ṣāḥiba took
off her daughter’s dress (utār kar) and handed it to Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb
to wash it. While he was on his way to wash the dress, several of his dis-
ciples arrived. Knowing the situation, they asked Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb
to return to the Bībī’s house. All of them pooling their resources, arranged
for the marriage ceremony and a feast to which they invited learned men
of the city. The man with whom this marriage was performed was Saiyyid
Ẓiyāʾu’d-Dīn.
Three days after the marriage, the daughter said to her husband,
“For your contentment and happiness, I have missed my supereroga-
tory (nawāfil) prayers for the last three days. Now if agreeable to you,
I would look for a well-mannered and beautiful bondmaid and present
her to you. I would, then, busy myself in my former shughul [prayers and
remembering Allāh] and would spend rest of my life in doing that.” At
this, Saiyyid Ẓiāu’d-Dīn said, “I wanted you to let me travel now, to behold
the manifestation of God’s attributes, and to remain busy in learning and
in controlling my ego (nafs). The intention of my stay, the good news fore-
told by Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb, has materialised.” Ṣāḥibzādī Ṣāḥiba said,
“I have memorised the Qurʾān and the boy of whose birth you are talk-
ing about would not be born, as foretold by Ḥaẓrat Burhānu’d-Dīn Ṣāḥib,
until he has memorised the Qurʾān. If by any chance, in preserving (ẓabṭ)
the Qurʾān more than the fixed duration [of pregnancy] is spent, people
would start accusing me. Therefore, you should call the neighbours, tell
them this secret and then be on your travel route.” Saiyyid Ẓiyāʾu’d-Dīn
230 Chapter 9

Ṣāḥib called the neighbours, informed them about the secret and named
the unborn, before birth, as Saiyyid ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn. He then left.
The town people were much grieved at the departure of Saiyyid
Ẓiyāʾu’d-Dīn. At the time of his departure, Saiyyid Ṣāḥib said about his
son that this child would be a believer and would always remain lost in
remembering God. Nine months later when Saiyyid ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn104 was
born, everyone brought presents for the new-born; Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb
bestowed the walāyat of Khandesh and Mongipatan to the baby.105

The narrative, from hence onward, turns to the story of Saiyyid ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn (d.
801/1398–1399).106 In conclusion, Rawnaq ʿAlī says that the tomb of Bībī ʿĀʾisha
lies to the south of the tomb of Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ’s close disciple
and complier of Fawāʾidu’l-fuʾād, Mīr Ḥasan ʿAlā Sijzi Dihlawī. The ʿurs of Bībī
ʿĀʾisha and of her daughter is celebrated on the seventh of Shaʿbān.107
The author of Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ, neither explains the ancestry of Bībī ʿĀʾisha
nor gives any details about her arrival in the Deccan. As she was already pres-
ent there, before the arrival of Ḥaẓrat Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb, it is assumed
that she might have arrived in the company of Ḥaẓrat Muntajibu’d-Dīn
(d. 709/1309), brother of Ḥaẓrat Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb and known as Zar Zarī
Zar Bakhsh (the giver of gold) who came to Khuldabad and settled on the Hoda
Hill. Despite the ambiguity about her, it is generally assumed that she was the
daughter of Bābā Faridu’d-Dīn.
The above narrative raises several questions that are significant in the con-
text of the history of Islam and particularly the history of Muslim women in
South Asia. The first thing that strikes readers is that a woman was living alone
along with her young daughter in a land far away from her native land and
people. We do not know how they supported themselves. We do not know why

104 Saiyyid ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn (d. 801/1398–99) came to be known as Saiyyid ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn Ẓiāʾu’l
Ḥusainī Chishtī. Saiyyid Imāmu’d-Dīn Aḥmad Naqwī Ḥanafī Gulshanābādī. 1322/1904.
Barakātu’l Awliyāʾ. Dehli: Afzalu’l Maṭābaʿ (new edition, 2015, Nasik). pp. 87–88
(Henceforth, referred to as Barakātu’l Awliyāʾ); Maḥbūb zil-manan-Tazkira Awliyāʾ-yi
dakan, pp. 530–38.
105 Rawẓat’l-aqṭāb, pp. 225–29; the story is repeated by Muḥammad ʿAbdu’l Jabbār Khan
Mulkapurī in Maḥbūb zil-manan-Tazkira Awliyāʾ-yi dakan, pp. 530–34.
106 For details of his shrine, see Roy Burman, J.J. 2002. Hindu-Muslim Syncretic Shrines and
Communities. New Delhi: Mittal Publications, pp. 173–74. The shrine of Ḥāfiz Saiyyid
ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn Ẓiāʾu’l Ḥusainī is located by the riverside in Ravna Parada Maharashtra, India
and is visited by a large number of devotees, including women and children. Splendid ʿurs
celebrations are held.
107 Muḥammad Wāḥid Khān. 1913. Chār Chaman Khuldābād Sharīf ma‌ʾ naqshājāt. Maṭba
ʿAbu’l ʿAla‌ʾī Hyderabad, Dakan, p. 19.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 231

and when they arrived there. More importantly, Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ knew
about her stay in the Deccan, but she does not appear in his discourses.
Looking at the details of the story, some other queries also arise. For
instance, why did Bībī ʿĀʾisha ask Ḥaẓrat Burhānʾud-Din Gharīb to wash the
clothes of her young unmarried daughter? This question becomes more valid
as earlier she was uncomfortable wondering why this unrelated person had
smiled at her daughter.
Four hundred years later, Bashīruddīn Aḥmad repeated Fatḥu’l awliyāʾ’s nar-
rative of Bībī ʿĀʾisha. In the opening line of his narrative, Bashīruddīn Aḥmad
acknowledges that no other text refers to the life of Bībī ʿĀʾisha, and whatever
is written in Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ is ‘nāqiṣ (deficient) and does not tell when she
[Bībī ʿĀʾisha] arrived in the Deccan [from north India].108 Later, in 1992, Carl
Ernst introduced this account of Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ to the wider Western readers.
Ernst, however, casts a shadow of doubt on the historic value of Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ
by commenting that this anonymous author’s skills as a chronicler are not
remarkable as he “took up entire passages from Firishta” and also that Fatḥu’l-
awliyāʾ was “an imperial manifesto with a hagiographical extension.”109 Both
these arguments, however, are not very relevant in the context of this narrative
because most other Sufi texts are hagiographical in content and approach.
Another difficulty arises as all the above three authors identify Bībī ʿĀʾisha
as the daughter of Bābā Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar. Contrary to this, Amīr
Khwurd, based upon his firsthand knowledge of the family life of the Bābā,
says that he heard from his grandfather, Saiyyid Mubārak Muḥammad
Kirmānī, that Bābā Farīd had three daughters (Shaikh al-Shaiūkhu’l-ʿālam sih
dukhtar būd). He then identifies these daughters as Bībī Mastūra, Bībī Sharīfa,
and Bībī Fāṭima; the name of Bībī ʿĀʾisha is not included in this list. Similarly,
Jawāhir-i Farīdī of ʿAlī Aṣghar Chishtī, completed in 1623, some three years
after Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ, lists the same three daughters as Amīr Khwurd did ear-
lier, and does not mention the name of Bībī ʿĀʾisha as one of the daughters.
Nizami, who is credited with having conducted an in-depth study of primary
Sufi texts, including manuscripts, also gives the names only of the above three
daughters of Bābā Farīd.110 Shāh Muḥammad Ḥasan Ṣābirī, however, does
mention a fourth daughter whom Bābā Farīd is said to have given in marriage
to his sister’s son, Shaikh ʿAlī Aḥmad Ṣābir, and who, according to another

108 Wāqiʿāt Dāru’l Ḥukūmat-i Dihlī (ḥiṣṣā duʾm), p. 252; Wahida Nasīm writes that this incident
occurred in Delhi, See Shahān-i-be Tāj. Karachi: Maktabā-i Asafiya, pp. 52–54.
109 Carl W. Ernst. Eternal Garden: Mysticism, History, and Politics at a South Asian Center. New
York: SUNY, p. 91.
110 K.A. Nizami. 1955. The Life and Times of Shaikh Faridud-Din Ganj-i Shakkar. Aligarh:
Aligarh Muslim University, p. 341.
232 Chapter 9

hagiographical account of the Ṣābirī Sufis, was burnt to ashes on her nuptial
night by the wrath of her husband.111 However, the presence of Bībī ʿĀʾisha’s
tomb and that of her daughter, in Khuldabad can be cited as one evidence of
the historicity of Bībī ʿĀʾisha. Waḥīda Nasīm, during her 1985 visit to the shrine,
saw women devotees tying coloured ribbons or shreds of fabric while making
supplications.112

(2)
Bībī Ashraf Jahāṅ Ḥaẓrat Mā Ṣāḥiba ashraf-i do-jahāṅ
Period: Fourteenth Century
Place: Koŕchi (or Kodachi in taluka Raybag) District Belgaum, Karnataka,
India
ʿUrs: 10 Rajab

Despite the imposing title of Ḥaẓrat Mā Ṣāḥiba ashraf-i do-jahāṇ (the respected
Mother—distinguished in both the worlds), the history of Ḥaẓrat Mā Ṣāḥiba
remains obscure as scarce references are found in either historical writings or
hagiographical texts. The life story of this illustrious woman ascetic is woven
with that of her adventurous son—ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn Ḥasan Gangū, the founding
Sulṭān of the Bahmani kingdom of the Deccan (r. 1347–1358). Ḥasan Gangū
developed close ties with the Chishtī emigrant Sufis in the Deccan.113
ʿAbdu’l Jabbār Khan Mulkapurī, an early twentieth-century researcher-
author of the history of Deccan, drawing upon several historical sources,
writes that the family of ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn Ḥasan’s mother belonged to Ghor. After
the death of her husband, Muḥammad Shāh, Ḥaẓrat Mā Ṣāḥiba, along with her
brother Hazbaru’d-Dīn Zafar Khan and two young sons, ʿAlī Shāh and Ḥasan
Shāh, came to Multan. Mulkapurī, who otherwise has presented a detailed
account of the personal life and the administration of ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn Ḥasan and
of his successors in nearly seven hundred pages, says nothing more about
Ḥaẓrat Mā Ṣāḥiba. It is important to note that Mulkapurī has identified her

111 Shāh Muḥammad Ḥasan Ṣābirī. 1856. Ḥaqīqat-i Gulzār-i Ṣabirī, Rampur: Ḥasanī Press,
p. 167.
112 Wahīda Nasīm, Shāhān-i-be tāj p. 55.
113 For a life account of ʿAlāʾud-dīn Ḥasan Gangū, based upon historical chronicles, see
Muḥammad ʿAbdu’l Jabbār Khan Mulkapurī. 1328/1910. Maḥbūb’l-watan: tazkira-yi
saḷātīn-i dakan. Ḥissā awwal, Dar bayān-i saḷātīn-i Bahmaniyyā. Hyderabad: Maṭbaʿ-i
Raḥmānī. Also, see H.K. Sherwani. 1985. The Bahmanis of the Deccan: An Objective Study.
Hyderabad: The Manager of Publications Saood Manzil.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 233

only as the mother of ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn Ḥasan, without identifying her by her name
or by her title.114
According to one popular legend, Mā Ṣāḥiba came from Bukhara, now in
Central Asia, to Koŕchi, a town on the banks of river Krishna and known as the
land of the Sufis.115 The Karanataka State Gazette, however, says that she came
from Arabia or Baghdad.116
Muḥammad Sulṭān, author of Armughān-i Sulṭānī al-maʿrūf sair-i Gulbarga
(A traveller’s gift, also known as travels through Gulbarga) offers some glimpses
of this pious woman’s journey through several vicissitudes—from a life of
worldly poverty, through royalty, and to her final destination of chosen pov-
erty ( faqr) of an ascetic (zāhid). Muḥammad Sultan identifies Mā Ṣāḥiba by
her name, Ḥaẓrat Ashraf Jahaṅ.117 He writes that Ḥaẓrat Mā Ṣāḥiba, driven by
several misfortunes and the disheartening attitudes of her kinsmen, arrived in
the Deccan as a destitute and settled in Sargapur (also known as Sargaur), near
Koŕchi. There, she heard about a pious person in Koŕchi, Shaikh Sirāju’d-Dīn
Junaidī (670/1278–781/1379), who could miraculously solve people’s problems.118
She then told her sons, “We are destitute. We would go to this Sufi and would
serve him. The Almighty might redress our problems as a blessing because of
his supplications.” The sons listened to their mother. The family—consisting
of her son, daughter-in-law, and two daughters—reached Koŕchi. The devoted
family’s visit brought spiritual as well as worldly gains. The spiritual blessings
of the saintly person were upon them, as all the members took the oath of
allegiance. The visit miraculously changed the course of history as very soon
Shaikh Junaidī placed the crown of the state at the head of ʿAlāʾud-Dīn Ḥasan.119
Drawing upon several previously written historical accounts of the Deccan,
Muḥammad Sulṭān writes that Ḥaẓrat Ashraf Jahaṅ never left the residence
of her spiritual mentor, Shaikh Sirāju’d-Dīn Junaidī. She died in Koŕchi on

114 Maḥbūb’l-watan: Tazkira-yi saḷātīn-i dakan, pp. 47–49.

115 Maruti Kamble. “Sufi saints of Karnataka.” International Journal of Social Sciences and
Humanity Studies, vol. 3 (1): 237–246 (online).
116 Suryanath U. Kamath.1987. Karnataka State Gazetteer: Belgaum. Bangalore: Government
Press. p. 912.
117 Armughān-i Sulṭānī, p. 142.
118 Khwāja Sirāju’d-Dīn Junaidī accompanied Sultan Muḥammad Bin Tughluq to the Deccan;
settled in Bijapur around 1330; became the spiritual guide to Sulṭān ʿAlau’d-Din Ḥasan
Bahmani; crowned Ḥasan Bahmani in 1347; received land grant of Korchi from the
Sultan, which continues till to-date; mausoleum is located in Shāh Bazar, Korchi,
Gulbarga; authored about 132 books and tracts. See Armughān-i Sulṭānī, pp. 125–56, also
Rawẓatu’lu’l-awliyāʾ, pp. 27–32; also, see Maḥbūb zil-manan-Tazkira Awliyāʾ-yi dakan,
pp. 391–93.
119 Armughān-i Sulṭānī, p. 142.
234 Chapter 9

10 Rajab 770/17 February 1369 and was buried outside the main entrance
of Koŕchi.120
Muḥammad Sulṭān, describing the numerous virtues of Ḥaẓrat Mā Ṣāḥiba
Ashraf-i do-jahāṅ and her true traditions of the ṭariqat, says that she preferred
a life of austerity to the luxury of a palace life. Despite being the mother of a
powerful ruler, she never took any money from him and lived until her last day
on whatever she earned by her labour.121
Hundreds of women and men come daily to her dargāh and on her ʿurs,
which is held in the month of Rajab, to offer homage to this Sufi who they
believe is their intercessor with the Divine and whose blessings they seek
through her mediation. Ḥaẓrat Mā Ṣāḥiba’s stature was so awe-striking that
hundreds of faqīrs who assembled at her shrine during her ʿurs celebrations
had to accept the decisions of the shrine management regarding the selection
of one of them as the head (sardār) of the group of all the faqīrs and mashāʾīkh,
irrespective of their Sufi affiliations. Muḥammad Sulṭān aptly concludes that
the son (ʿAlāʾud-Dīn Ḥasan) desired worldly kingdom and he got it; the mother
sought the realm of faith (dīn kī shāhī) and she was blessed with it.122
Several websites and internet entries, including a Facebook account in her
name, have published descriptions of her ʿurs celebrations and images of her
dargāh.

(3)
Būbū Abādī/ Bībī Bū Abadī/ Baŕī Buā
Period: Fourteenth Century
Place: Ayodhya, UP, India
Shrine: Panchakaroshi Road Ayodhya-Faizabad UP, India

The legendary city of Ayodhya in northern India, stands in the memory of the
Muslims of the subcontinent as Khurd Makka (little Makka). Here, among sev-
eral monuments of antiquity, stands until today the shrine of Baŕī Buā (liter-
ally, the elder sister) or Bībī Bū Abādī at a railway crossing between Ayodhya
and Faizabad (also spelt Fyzabad).123

120 Ibid, p. 146, 149.

121 Ibid, p. 149.
122 Ibid, p. 149.
123 Sarvesh Kumar and Rana B.P. Singh. 2017. “Muslim Cultural Landscape of Ayodhya-
Faizabad (India): a geographical scenario.” The Geographer, 64 (2): 81–96; Asim of Noor
Images (www.noorimages.com), in an email, dated 7.30.16, described to me Baŕī Buā’s
tomb, inside a small white-washed locked enclosure. People, however, come to offer
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 235

Three Persian Sufi texts offer information, albeit sketchy, about this illustri-
ous and virtuous woman who remains a source of great spiritual comfort to her
devoted visitors, most being females. The first of these texts is Khairʾul-majālis,
the fourteenth-century malfūz of Baŕī Buā’s brother, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn
Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī (1276–1356), a devoted disciple and khalīfa of Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ of the Chishtī sisila by Ḥāmid Qalandar. Ḥāmid Qalandar
added a supplement (ẓamīma) to his text, providing the most valuable infor-
mation about the personal life of the Shaikh and about his family, including
Baŕī Buā, which is neither found in the actual text of the malfūz nor in any
other contemporary text.124 Even the main text of the malfūz carries no refer-
ence to the Shaikh’s family.
Our second source, which provides indirect reference to Baŕī Buā, is
Siyaru’l-ʿᾹrifīn, a biographical compendium of Chishtī and Suhrawardī Sufis
of South Asia of Ḥāmid bin Faẓlu’llah Jamālī Kamboh (d. 1536). This reference
is given in a section on the life of her illustrious brother, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn
Maḥmūd. Writing in 1530–1536, almost 180 years after the passing away of
Khawāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd, Jāmālī could spare only a few lines for her and
describes her anonymously by an august appellation as Rābiʿa ʿaṣr (the Rāʿbia
[al-ʿAdawiyya] of her times).125 Jamālī, however, has heavily borrowed from
Khairʾul-majālis, often making verbatim statements without acknowledging
his source.126
The third source is Bahr-e Zakhkhār. Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf is the only author
who presents a separate biographical notice of Bībī Bū Abadī, and thus restores
her rightful place in the annals of lives of the mystics of South Asia.127 In his
narrative, though, he has not used this name but refers to her as Baŕī Buā.
When Bībī Bū Abādī came to be addressed as the elder sister of all, i.e., Baŕī
Buā (a local term), is not known.
I would, first, follow the details as given in Khairʾul-majālis about the
ancestry of Baŕī Buā’s family and would add additional information only
in the footnotes. From Khairʾul-majālis we know that the grandfather of

prayers and to make offerings from outside the gate itself. Also, see www.asimrafiqui.com/
blog/2009/…
124 This supplement is found only in Nizami’s edited text of Khairu’l-majālis, which is a copy
of the manuscript in the holdings of the Asafiya Library, Hyderabad. See Ḥāmid Qalandar
and Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 1959. Khair-u’l-majālis: conversations of Shaikh Nasir-u’d-din
Chirāgh of Delhi compiled by Hamid Qalandar. Aligarh: Muslim University, pp. 282–90.
For a cohesive account of Ḥāmid Qalandar’s life, see Ibid, pp. 3–6.
125 Jamālī, p. 93.
126 See Nizami’s Introduction, KM, pp. 10–17.
127 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar. pp. 369–370.
236 Chapter 9

Shaikh Nāṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd and Baŕī Buā was a scion of a family of Khorasan
and was pushed to migrate to Lahore by the Mongol scourge.128 Shaikh
Nāṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd’s father, Shaikh Yaḥyā,129 was born at Lahore.130 At
some stage, the emigrant family moved from Lahore to settle down finally in
Awadh where Shaikh Nāṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd and his sisters were born.131 In
Awadh, Shaikh Yaḥyā lived an affluent life as a wool (pashmīna) merchant
and had several employees (ghulāmān) working for him.132 When Shaikh
Yaḥyā died, perhaps in 1280, he left behind a nine-year-old son, Naṣīru’d-Dīn
Maḥmūd, who was tenderly looked after by his widowed mother, matchless in
her potentials and modesty (dar ṣalāḥ wa ʿiffat nazīr nā dāsht).133 She brought
up her children with great efforts (saʿy-i-balīgh).134 She died a little later after
Khwāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd’s arrival in Delhi, which happened when he was
about forty-three years old, perhaps sometime in 1319 or a little later. Her grave
existed in Awadh.135
Shaikh Nāṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd had two sisters—the elder was Bībī Bū Abādī
and the younger was Bībī Lahrī.136 Bībī Bū Abādī, according to Ḥāmid Qalandar,
had one son named Maulānā Shaikh Zainu’d-Dīn ʿAlī. Bībī Lahrī also had one
son, Maulānā Shaikh Kamālu’d-Dīn.137 In the absence of dates of birth and
death of Ḥaẓrat Bībī Bū Abadī, one can speculate that she was born a few years
before the year 1276/1277, her younger brother Khwāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd’s
birth year. Although the date of birth of Khwāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd is also
not firm, Nizami calculates it to be about 675/1276–1277.138
The first two authors mentioned above, Ḥāmid Qalandar and Jamālī
Kamboh, and even other later scribes have not given any further accounts of
Baŕī Buā’s spiritual life. The only exception is Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf who extols
her in the usual ornate Persian phrases, such as Rābiʿa ʿaṣriya (Rābiʿa of her age),

128 See f. n. no. 1 in Urdu translation of Siyaru’l ʿᾹrifīn of Hāmid bin Faẓlu’llah Kamboh Jamālī
by Ayyūb Qadri, p. 125.
129 Ḥāmid Qalandar identifies him as Yusuf, see KM, p. 282; Jamālī gives his name as Yaḥyā;
Nizami, after assessing several other sources, has preferred Yaḥyā as the actual name.
I prefer Nizami’s arguments. See, Nizami, Introduction, KM, p. 39.
130 Jamālī, p. 92.
131 KM, p. 282.
132 K.A. Nizami. 1991. The Life and Times of Shaikh Nasiru’d din Chiragh-i-Delhi. Delhi: I.A.D,
p. 22.
133 KM, p. 282.
134 Jamālī, p. 92.
135 KM, p. 283.
136 KM, p. 284; Muhammad Habib identifies her as Bibi Lahorī and the elder sister as Bibi
Buhā-Abadi, see, Habib, Mohammad. 1974. Politics and Society During the Early Medieval
Period, Vol. 1. New Delhi: People’s Publishing House, p. 360.
137 Ibid, p. 284.
138 See, KM, Nizami’s Introduction, p. 38, f. n. 1.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 237

afẓala-yi dahr ba kamālāt-i humāyūn (the noblest in the world on account of

her blessed virtues), and waliyya bā kamāl ṣafā (a friend of God with virtues of
purity). Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf says that Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn used to refer to her
as mādar-i mihirbān (affectionate mother).139 While Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn went
away to Delhi to serve his Shaikh, Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, Baŕī Buā, who
in perfection was like Āsya the Great and in miraculous powers like Mariyam,140
remained engrossed in remembering Allāh in her small chamber in Awadh
(dar awadh ba ḥujra mashghūl ba ḥaqq).141 Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf, on the author-
ity of oral traditions that he heard from trustworthy persons (az siqat shunīda),
says that suddenly a tyrant officer belonging to the elite class of Awadh (ḥākim
zālim az ra‌ʾusā-yi awadh) arrived and forced Baŕī Buā to marry him. In anger
and distress, Baŕī Buā tried to disfigure herself by shaving her head and scratch-
ing her face (mū-i sar khud rā tarāshīda wa rū-i khud rā kharāshīda). As it hap-
pens with the powerless, her pleas went unheard and the Qāẓī did not listen to
her (hech masmūʿ na-kard). Next morning, which was Friday, the Qāẓī decided
to hold the marriage sermon (khuṭba-yi ʿaqd). In the meantime, by his power of
the inner self (az sharf-i bāṭin), Khwāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd came to know of
this whole affair and, travelling with miraculous speed (ṭayyʾul-ʿarẓ), arrived at
the doorstep of the Qāẓī’s house in Awadh and knocked. Hearing of the arrival
of her brother, Baŕī Buā burst into tears. The brother comforted his grieving sis-
ter, telling her not to worry and to rest assured (khāṭir jamaʿ dārad). He told her,
“Apparently, though I have no power, I have God with me. Neither the tyrant
nor the scholar will last” (agar chih zor nā dāram magar khudā dāram, nā zālim
mānd nā ʿālim). When the tyrant officer and the Qāẓī, along with their accom-
plices from among the elite of the city, assembled with great jubilation and
triumph for Friday prayers and for the marriage, Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd
made the roof of the mosque collapse; none of the tyrants survived.
Contemporary sources refer to Shaikh Zainu’d-Dīn as the son of Baŕī Buā.
There are no references to when or whom Baŕī Buā married. Subsequent to the
death of Baŕī Buā, Khwāja Naṣīru’d-Dīn brought his two orphaned nephews
to Delhi and raised them up under his care. Shaikh Zainu’d-Dīn’s descendants
were living around Amethi (a small town in UP, India) at the time of writing of
Bahr-e Zakhkhār.142

139 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, p. 369.

140 For the life of Ḥaẓrat Ᾱsiā and Ḥaẓrat Maryam (Mary), see Barbara F. Stowasser. 1994.
Women in the Qurʾān, Traditions, and Interpretation. (pp. 57–61; 67–81) NY: OUP.
141 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, p. 369.
142 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, p. 370.
238 Chapter 9

With a heart that knew only the fear of Allāh, this pious and virtuous woman
never succumbed to the dictates of men in power.143 Legends and oral tradi-
tions often repeated by her devotees, both Muslims and Hindus, who come to
her shrine to seek her blessings and renew their courage and faith in the Divine
power, recall the resilience of this woman. What this fearless woman told her
contemporaries was what her brother had told her—that neither the cleric nor
the tormentor would last long. These words, though based on oral hagiographi-
cal traditions, stand as a powerful message, much needed by women of today,
circumvented and oppressed by truncated civil codes and by the fabricated
male versions of the Divine commands.144
Within the shrine complex of Baŕī Buā are the tombs of Shaikh Zainu’d-Dīn
ʿAlī Awadhi and Shaikh Kamālu’d-Dīn Awadhi—Baŕī Buā’s son and nephew—
and Shaikh Fatehu’llah Awadhi.145 Interestingly, the shrine of Baŕī Buā was
repaired in 1977 by a Hindu, Mahant Ram Mangal Das of Gokul Bhawan of
Ayodhya.146

(4)
Dādī Bakhtūʾī
Period: Fourteenth Century
Shrine: Amroha, UP, India

Dādī Bakhtūʾī, whose tomb is built within the enclosure of the shrine of
Saiyyidu’l ʿĀrifīn Saiyyid Ḥasan, known as Ḥaẓrat Shāh Wilāyat Sharfu’d-Dīn
ʿAlī, along with the tombs of other members of his family in Amroha, belongs
to late fourteenth century. Ḥaẓrat Shāh Wilāyat, whose ancestry is traced to
the tenth Imām, ImāmʿAlī Naqi (829–868), came from Wāsit in Iraq to Multan
and from there travelled to Amroha, in the modern day UP, sometime in the
early fourteenth century during the time of Sultan Ghiyasu’d-Dīn Tughlaq
(r. 1320–1325).147 Shāh Wilāyat, who also built his khānqāh (which existed until

143 Habib, Mohammad. 1946. “Shaikh Nasir al-Din Chiragh-i-Delhi as a Great Historical
Personality.” Islamic Culture, (20): 129–53.
144 It is interesting to mention here that a Muslim orphanage, named the Bari Bua Muslim
Yatim khana, was established in 1935 in the District of Faizabad on the Ayodhya-Faizabad
Road and continues to offer shelter to the orphans, Esha Basabti Joshi, 1960. Uttar Pradesh
Gazetteers: Faizabad (Text & Supplement). Uttar Pradesh (India), Government of Uttar
Pradesh, p. 341.
145 Jamālī identifies both of these as the sons of Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd’s elder sister,
p. 93.
146 ‘Muslim Cultural Landscape of Ayodhya-Faizabad (India): a geographical scenario’, p. 7.
147 For a detailed note on the life of Shāh Wilāyat, see Maḥmūd Aḥmad ʿAbbāsī. 1932.
Tazkiratʾul kirām-yʿānī Tārīkh-i Amroha ki jild sānī. Dehli: Maḥbūbul maṭāb῾ Barqī Press,
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 239

the eighth Hijri),148 is also credited by some with laying the foundation of the
town of Amroha.149 Shāh Wilāyat was a follower of the Suhrawardī silsila.
Dādī Bakhtūʾī’s actual name is Bakhtūʾī; Dādī is an honorific title which
means an elderly lady or grandmother. All the Urdu texts, as well as the British
Government Survey Reports, refer to Dādī Bakhtūʾī as Musammāt (a woman,
for example the use of Miss or Mrs. for a woman) Bakhtūʾī and describe her as
the daughter of Shāh Wilāyat.150 Neville also reported that she was a daugh-
ter of Shāh Wilāyat.151 Contrary to the textual evidence, local legends uphold
that Dādī Bakhtūʾī was the sister of Shāh Wilāyat. These local legends say that
she was married to a prince. These popular legends also claim that, realising
her natal family was no match for her princely husband’s life of wealth, Dādī
Bakhtūʾī prayed for her own death. The Earth swallowed her, leaving a piece of
her braid sticking out of the ground. Soon a tree grew up at the place where the
braid was sticking out. The branches of the tree, entwined like strands of
a braid, bear sugar-coated fruits. Devotees who visit Shāh Wilāyat’s shrine
also come to the shrine of Dādī Bakhtūʾī, tie coloured rags and ribbons to the
branches of this tree, and make offerings. Neville reported that the shrine was
visited by women forty days after the birth of their children.152

(5)
Bībī Fāṭima
Period: Fourteenth Century
Shrine: ʿUsmānābād, Awrangābād Division, Maharashtra, India
ʿUrs: 15–17 Rajab al-murajjab

Narratives of Bībī Fāṭima are extinct in texts. Her grave lies next to that of
her husband, Khwāja Shamsu’d-Dīn, popularly known as Ghāzī Bābā. Local

pp. 4–20; also, by the same author Tārikh-i Amroha. Mumbai: Kitābdār, 2005 (originally
written in 1930), p. 45; Justin Jones. 2009. “The Local Experiences of Reformist Islam in
a ‘Muslim’ Town in Colonial India: The Case of Amroha.” Modern Asian Studies, 43 (4),
p. 875.
148 Tārīkh-i Amroha, 137.
149 Justin Jones. 2012. Shiʾa Islam in Colonial India. Religion, Community and Sectarianism.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
150 Tārīkh-i Amroha, p. 119; Jamāl Aḥmad Naqvi. 1934. Tārīkh-i Sādāt-i Amroha. Hyderabad,
Deccan: ʿᾹẓam Steam Press, p. 285, 288; Anton Führer. 1891. The Monumental Antiquities
and Inscriptions, in the North-Western Provinces and Oudh, described and arranged by A.
Führer. Allahabad: Government Press, p. 34.
151 H.R. Neville. 1911. Moradabad. A Gazetteer. Vo. xvi. Allahabad: Superintendent Government
Press, p. 181.
152 Ibid, p. 181.
240 Chapter 9

legends ascribe a narrative of Ghāzī Bābā’s journey with several hundred Sufis
across the Arabian Sea, from the shores of Dehmun or Dammam in 730/1329,
first to Delhi and from there via Awrangābād to his final halt at ʿUsmānābād
(or Osmanabad), which at that time bore the name of Dharasur. It is said that
Khwāja Shamsu’d-Dīn earned the title of Ghāzī (the victor) after slaying a
devil named Dharasur who controlled the region now known as ʿUsmānābād.
On the three-day ʿurs celebrations, women in large numbers participate and
make vows at the tomb of Bībī Fāṭima. Women are not allowed to enter the
shrine precincts of Ghāzī Bābā. Out of respect for the local traditions, beef is
not allowed in the shrine complex. Women offer flowers, coconuts, and sweets.
Pieces of hair, believed to belong to Bībī Fāṭima, hang from one of the walls of
her shrine. Women come in large numbers to view this hair, which is believed
to have great healing powers.153

(6)
Bībī Jawindī
Date: D. 805/1402
Place: Uchch Sharīf, Pakistan

Seventy-five kilometres from Bahawalpur, in the Bahawalpur District in South

Punjab, stands the splendid shrine of Bībī Jawindī,154 believed to be the
great-granddaughter of Makhdūm Jahāṅiyaṅ Jahāṅgasht (1308–1384) of the
Suhrawardī Sufi silsila.155 The imposing mausoleum with its ornate patterns,
constructed in 900/1403 at the instruction of one Muḥammad Dilshād, a ruler
of Khurasan,156 is definitely the best example of medieval artisanship and
stands as the finest homage to the memory of Bībī Jawindī.
Despite a good number of devotees, tourists, locals, and foreigners, the story
of Bībī Jawindī, the woman buried in this finest piece of funerary architec-
ture, remains little known. The mausoleum itself is in a highly neglected state.
As one approaches the sandy open area of Uchch, where the shrine of Bībī
Jawindī stands, several tombs, most unmarked and all covered with thick lay-
ers of dust, come into view; some raised ones have lost the engravings and

153 J.J. Roy Burman. 2002. Hindu-Muslim Syncretic Shrines and Communities. New Delhi:
Mittal Publications, pp. 221–223.
154 Beale says that her original name was Bībī Zinda Ābādi, see Thomas W. Arnold. 1881. The
Oriental Biographical Dictionary. London: W.H. Allen & Co., p. 107.
155 For the life of Jahaṅiyaṅ Jahāṅgasht see, Ayyūb Qādirī. 1963. Ḥaẓrat Makhdūm Jahāṅiān
Jahāṅgasht, Karachi: Saʿīd Company; also, Jalāluddīn Munīr Shāh. 1899. Safar nāma-i
Makhdūm Jahāṅiān Jahāṅgasht. Delhi: Maṭbʿ-i Aḥmadī.
156 Ahmad Nabi Khan, 1980. Uchchh History and Architecture. Islamabad: National Institute
of Historical and Cultural Research, p. 59.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 241

inscriptions; all show a serious disregard for the past. A metal board posted
by the Department of Archaeology, Government of Pakistan, provides a brief
note in English introducing the visitors to Bībī Jawindī. A similar metal board is
there in the Urdu language. The text of the two boards, indeed, are the primary
textual evidence about the life of Bībī Jawindī. Orally transmitted traditions,
which one can hear from the local rustic visitors of the shrine, are the only
source about the piety and virtues of the reposing woman. Indeed, little or no
research has been conducted to explore the life of Bībī Jawindī. Most works
that mention her replicate what the Bahawalpur Gazetteer recorded about her
in 1904, which says that she “was a very pious lady, highly respected by the
people for her devotion to religion.”157 The Gazetteer also gives 805/1403 as the
date of her death and refers to the floods of the Chenab river which cut down
half of the dome of the shrine; the remaining half still exists today.
Answers are not found as to what led Muḥammad Dilshād of Khurasan to
build Bībī Jawindī’s tomb in Uchch. The mausoleum is octagonal on the exte-
rior, with the interior walls angled to form a circle. The thick walls rise to two
stories, transforming by way of squinches into a sixteen-sided drum upon
which a dome sits, supported by bell-shaped brackets. Both the interior and
exterior walls are decorated with a profusion of faience revetment. When I vis-
ited the shrine in February 2016, I found the monument in an unkempt state,
though some rudimentary work of restoration was in progress. I did not see
any supervised work at restoration, only rusted scaffolding and one or two
labourers taking out rubble in baskets placed on their heads.
Some 170 years before my visit in 2016, Munshi Mohan Lal (1812–1877), an
employee of the East India Company, mentioned in his travel accounts the
havoc of the flood mentioned above. He gives a brief description of the tomb
as he saw it, writing, “Zinda Ahadi commonly called Bībī Jind Wadi by the
people of Uchch, was one of the descendants of Sayyad Jalal. She is buried
at Uchch in Multan. The dome in which she rests is erected of burnt bricks
and cemented by mortar. The whole of the edifice is ornamented by various
hues, and lapis lazuli of the celebrated mines of Badakhshan.”158 There were
few traces of the dazzling turquoise tiles and embellishment with lapis lazuli
from Badakhshan and Central Asia when Mohan Lal visited it.159 Mohan Lal

157 Bahawalpur State Gazetteer with Maps, 1904. 1908. Lahore: Civil and Military Gazette
Press, p. 390.
158 Mohan Lal. 1846. Travels in the Punjab, Afghānistan, Turkistan, to Balkh, Bokhara, and
Herat; and a visit to Great Britain and Germany. London: W.H. Allen & Co., p. 454; for
details on the life and work of Mohan Lal, see C.A. Bayly. 1996. Empire and informa-
tion intelligence gathering and social communication in India, 1780–1870 (pp. 230–232).
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
159 Ibid, p. 455.
242 Chapter 9

was so much shocked by the ruinous state of the shrine of Bībī Jawindī, whom
he refers to as Zinda Ahadi, that he wrote another article about it, this time to
draw the attention of the members of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, a research
society established in 1784 to promote what it described as “oriental research.”
In his paper, Mohan Lal concluded that the exquisite mausoleum was ruined
by floods and by human neglect, a fact that the above metal boards avoid
acknowledging.160 Today the shrine, declared a world heritage site by UNESCO,
is claimed to be restored and renovated by the Archaeology Department.
On my visit to the shrine, I found devotees were few; those present looked
more like tourists from the nearby localities. My research assistant tried to
talk with some present there, but none responded well. In my research, little
was found about the spiritual merits of Bībī Jawindī; more is written about
the funerary architecture of the tomb and its embellishments. Contrary to the
conspicuous silence about Bībī Jawindī in Sufi texts, facts and hagiographical
anecdotes about the male Sufis buried in Uchch and Multan are profuse.

Figure 2 Shrine of Bībī Jawindī, Uchch Sharīf

160 Mohan Lal, Munshi, 1836. ‘Description of Uch-Sahrif.’ The Journal of the Asiatic Society of
Bengal, Vol. 5, (Edited by John Prinscep, Calcutta: Printed at the Baptist Mission Press),
pp. 796–99.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 243

Figure 3 Back view of the shrine of Bībī Jawindī Uchch Sharīf

Figure 4 Metal board posted by the Department of Archaeology, Government of Pakistan,

provides a brief note in the Urdu language introducing the visitors to Bībī Jawindī,
Uchch Sharīf
244 Chapter 9

(7)
Khwān Bībī Ṣāḥiba
Period: Mid-Fourteenth Century
Place: Khuldabad, India

Khwān Bībī’s name—prefaced with the word maulānā, which is an hon-

orific designation meaning a learned person, traditionally reserved for men
only—shows her status as a learned person. Its use with the name of a female
is indeed exceptional. It is not certain whether Khwān is her real name or a
title, as the word khwān literally means a dinner table and perhaps because of
an episode that is discussed later in this biographical notice, she was named
as such. She was probably called Maulānā Khwān Bībī as she not only could
read and recite but could do it with perfection and hence she was known as
maulānā. A more rational explanation is given by Muḥammad ʿAbdul Majīd,
the narrator of the story of Khwān Bībī. He argues that, as tālib-i mawlā is used
to refer to both male and female seekers of God, the designation maulānā is
rightfully accorded to her.161
Khwān Bībī’s brief life-sketch is given in the longer narrative of Maulānā
Zainu’d-Dīn Shīrāzī (701/1301–771/1369), the favourite scholarly disciple and
khalīfa of Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb (d. 1338), by Muḥammad ʿAbdul Majīd, the
erudite translator of Āzād Bilgrāmi’s Persian work, Rawẓatu’l Awliyāʾ, in Urdu.162
The translator has added long footnotes, running into several pages, and sev-
eral supplements about the life stories of Sufis. A story to illustrate the caring
and nurturing nature of Maulānā Zainu’d-Dīn Shīrāzī, given in a supplement
added in this Urdu translation, tells us about Maulānā Khwān Bībī. Under the
heading of mutābannā ṣāḥibzādi (adopted daughter), ʿAbdul Majīd, without
providing any information about the blood parents of Khwān Bībī, writes that
since her early childhood she grew up under the affectionate care of Maulānā
Zainu’d-Dīn Shīrāzī.163
A local legend, however, says that Khwān Bībī was born to a childless Hindu
ruler who sought Maulānā Zainu’d-Dīn’s blessings in begetting a child. When
a daughter was born, the Raja in thanksgiving offered her to the Mawlānā. A
strong bond grew between the infant and the Maulānā who tenderly brought

161 Muḥammad ʿAbdu’l Majīd Ghulām. Ᾱzād Bilgrāmi’s Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ al-maʿrūf Nafahātu’l
Asfiyāʾ. Hyderabad: Maṭbaʿ-i Karīmī, (1345/1926), p. 127.
162 For a brief note on Maulānā Zainu’d-Dīn Shīrāzī, see Muḥammad ʿAbdu’l Majīd. 1345/1926.
Ẓamīma Jadīda number 4 az mutarajjim in his Urdu translation of Ᾱzād Bilgrāmi’s
Rawẓatu’l awliya‌ʾ al-maʿrūf Nafahātu’l Asfiyā. (Hyderabad: Maṭbaʿ-i Karīmī), pp. 123–24.
163 Ibid, pp. 126–127.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 245

her up. It is said that when she cried for milk, the Maulānā let her suck his
index finger from which milk oozed out.164
Maulānā Zainu’d-Dīn not only took care of her physical needs but also
helped her grow and mature as a person of great spiritual heights. As the child
grew, her longing for knowledge also increased. Along with the virtues of being
a devotee and an ascetic, she attained the stage of mukāshifa (manifestation/
intuitive knowledge) by acquiring the inward (ʿilm-i bāṭini) and the outward
sciences (ʿilm-i zāhiri) under the guidance of Maulānā Zainu’d-Dīn. ʿAbdul
Majīd cites an anecdote that shows the miraculous powers of Khwān Bībī.
According to this account, once while she was in a state of spiritual intoxica-
tion (ḥālat-i sakr), the time for meal came. The table was laid out and she was
summoned. When she arrived, the meal had not yet begun, but she took the
bread in her hands and said, “take it and eat it.” When Maulānā Zainu’d-Dīn
enquired to whom she was giving the bread, she said, “Can’t you see a beggar
(sāʾil) in Makka Mʿuazzamā (the Exalted Makka) asking for bread and I am
giving these to him.”165

(8)
Ḥaẓrat Bībī Khwānd Mā Ṣāḥiba
Period: D. Late Fourteenth Century
Shrine: Koŕchi, Bijapur, India
ʿUrs: 5 Rabiʿus-sānī

Known by various other aliases, such as Zachchā Bī and Sitti Mā Ṣāḥiba, the
account of Ḥaẓrat Bībī Khwānd Mā Ṣāḥiba is found in some detail in Rawẓatu’l
awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur (the tombs or gardens of the Sufis of Bijapur). The author,
paying tribute to her virtues, calls her walī-yi kāmil (the perfect Sufi).166 Bībī
Khwānd Mā was not her real name. Her real name was Māh Khātūn.167
Bībī Khwānd Mā Ṣāḥiba had Sufi ancestors. She was the daughter of
Shaikhu’l-Shuyūkh Ḥaẓrat ʿAinu’d-Dīn Ganju’l ʿIlm Junaidī (b. 706/1306)168 and

164 Roy Burman, J.J. 2002. Hindu-Muslim syncretic shrines and communities. New Delhi: Mittal
Publications, p. 77.
165 Rawẓatu’l awliya‌ʾ al-maʿrūf Nafahātu’l Asfiyā, pp. 126–27.
166 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, pp. 27–32 and 222–223.
167 Ibid, p. 30; Bashīr u’d-Dīn Aḥmad. 1915. Wāqiʿāt-i Mamlakat-i Bījāpūr (ḥiṣṣā dom). Agra:
Maṭbaʿ Mufīd-i ʿĀm. (Henceforth, referred to as Wāqiʿāt-i Mamlukat-i Bījāpūr). p. 104.
168 ʿAinu’d-Dīn Ganju’l ʿIlm Junaidī (b. 706/1306) was born near Delhi. Later, travelling
through Gujarat, he migrated to the Deccan and in 773 H reached Bijapur. He was present
at the time of the coronation of Sultan Alauddin Hasan Gangū Bahmani (1347). Rawẓatu’l
awliya‌ʾ-yi Bijāpur, the only source on the life of Bībī Khwānd Mā Ṣāḥiba, gives 795/1395 as
the year of his demise, pp. 27–32; Maḥbūb zil-manan-Tazkira Awliyāʾ-yi dakan, pp. 538–49.
246 Chapter 9

his wife, Nāz Bībī, daughter of Shaikh Sirāju’d-Dīn Junaidī (706/1306–795/1393).

Ḥaẓrat Ganju’l ʿIlm Junaidī was born near Delhi but, as with most other schol-
ars and elite, reached Deccan sometime around 730/1329 after travelling
through Jaipur and Gujarat.169
We have no information about the year of birth of Bībī Khwānd Mā or about
her married life except that she had two sons who lie buried close to her grave.170
Referred to by honorific titles such as karāmat maṣdar (fountainhead of spiri-
tual powers) and walīyya daurāṅ (the Friend of Allāh of all the times), Bībī
Khwānd Mā remains a much-revered woman Sufi. She had memorised the
Qurʾān at an early age.
The Bībī, rightfully called rawnaq-i dīn (the splendour of faith) and faiẓ
mazhar (the manifestation of munificence), reposes in her shrine close to that
of her illustrious father.171 Although we do not know the date of Bībī Khwānd
Mā’s demise, we know that she died before 1393, the year of her father’s death.
According to one local legend, the illustrious father was first buried next to
his virtuous daughter’s grave. One day, a person visiting their shrines mistook
the other grave (that of Bībī Khwānd Mā Ṣāḥiba) as the grave of Ganju’l ʿIlm’s
wife. That night Ḥaẓrat Ganju’l ʿIlm appeared in a dream to his attendant and
instructed him to transfer his grave to a different location, a little distance away
from that of his daughter. The order was carried out the very next day.172
According to another popular local legend, once, as soon as a robber with
a horse that he had stolen passed by her shrine in the darkness of night, day-
light suddenly broke out. Puzzled by this happening, the perplexed thief went
inside her shrine and began rubbing his forehead on the floor in repentance,
weeping and bemoaning to seek the Bībī’s forgiveness and to shield his honour.
His supplication was heard; miraculously the form and colour of the horse was
transformed so much that nobody recognised it as the stolen horse. In homage,
the thief built a chaukhandī (dome) over her tomb. Later, the Sultans of the
Deccan made several land grants, including small towns and villages (qaryājāt
wa dihāt), for the maintenance and upkeep of the shrines and for the expenses
of the ʿurs celebrations of Bībī Khwānd Mā Ṣāḥiba and her father, Ganju’l ʿIlm.173

For a short biography of Ḥaẓrat Shaikh ʿAinu’d-Dīn, see al-Hajj Raja Hassan Chowdhry.
2005. Ḥaẓrat Shaikh ʿAinu’d-Dīn Ganju’l ‘ulūm Junaidī Bijāpurī. Bijāpur: Asār Maḥall.
169 Maḥbūb zil-manan-Tazkira-yi Awliyāʾ-i dakkan, pp. 538–539.
170 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, p. 222.
171 Ibid, p. 30.
172 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, p. 30; also, Maḥbūb zil-manan-Tazkira Awliyāʾ-yi dakan. p. 541;
also, Wāqiʿāt-i Mamlukat-i Bījāpūr (ḥiṣṣa doʾm), pp. 104–105.
173 Rawẓatu’l awliya‌ʾ-yi Bijāpur, p. 223.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 247

(9)
Lallā ʿArifā
Date: D. 750/1355
Place: Kashmir

Lallā, the fourteenth-century mystic woman from Kashmir, is known as ʿārifa

to the Muslims and Lāl Ded or Lallā Yogishwari to the Hindus. Lore, legends,
and hagiographies cover the real story of her life. Interest in her life is so
great that at a time when women’s biographies were rarely written, Munshi
Muḥammad Dīn Fauq (1877–1945), a Kashmiri journalist and author of sev-
eral valuable books, in 1929 chose to write a short biography of Lallā ʿᾹrifa in
Urdu. Interestingly, the book was published by Darul Ishāʿat, Lahore, a press
established by the Urdu-language journalist Muḥammadi Begam, who with
her husband had established a publishing house promoting literature by and
about women.174Almost thirteen years later, in 1942, Darul Ishāʿat’s pioneering
Urdu-language journal for women, Tahzib-un niswan, published an article in
four parts on Lallā ʿᾹrifa for the benefit of women readers. Drawing upon leg-
ends and folklore, this long paper reasserted Lallā’s common acceptance by the
Muslims and the Hindus.175 Her verses and couplets brimming with spiritual
content in Kashmiri language continue till today as a solace to a soul yearning
for spirituality. Because of her early life lived as a Hindu, some scholars claim
her as a Bhakti reformer and not as a Muslim Sufi.176 On the other hand, she is
also claimed to have been the disciple of Shaikh Bulbul Shāh (d. 727/1326), a
Suhrawardī Sufi who came to Kashmir from Central Asia.177 Modern-day schol-
ars, re-evaluating Lallā’s contribution to spirituality, tend to look at her beyond
sectarian divides.178
According to tradition, Lallā was born in Saupura village near Srinagar in
735/1335 to a Pandit family and was a devotee of Shiva. Marital life brought mis-
eries in her life and she began wandering in the woods and forests, wearing the

174 Munshī Muḥammad Dīn Fauq. 1929. Lallā ʿᾹrifa. Lahore: Darul Ishāʿat.
175 Maulānā Muḥammad ‘ʿAbdullāh Qureshī. 1942. “Lallā ʿᾹrifa.” Tahzīb-un Niswān, 45 (18)
273–78; (19): 291–96; (20): 309–12; and (21): 322–26.
176 See for the English translation of Lallā’s verses composed in the Kashmiri language in
Lalla-Vākyāni or the Wise Sayings of Lal Ded by George Grierson and Lionel D. Barnett
(London: The Royal Asiatic Society, 1920). G.L. Tikku. 1963. “Mysticism in Kashmir: In the
Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries,” in The Muslim World, 53 (3): 226–233.
177 Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyya‌ʾ, jild dom. pp. 424–26.
178 Papers presented at a seminar in Srinagar in 1998, emphasised this peace-creating aspect
of Lalla’s voice. See, Ghulām Nabī Khayal. 1998. ʿLalla ʿĀrifa aur Shaikhu᾽l ʿĀlam kā tqābuli
jāʾīzā,’ (pp. 33–38) in Karawān-i Khayāl. Srinagar: Kashmiri Writers’ Conference.
248 Chapter 9

dress of yogini, in search of peace, often reciting her own verses.179 Legends say
that she embraced Islam at the hands of Ḥaẓrat Jalālu’d-Dīn Bukhārī Jahāṅiyaṅ
Jahāṅgasht (the world trotter) (d. 1384). A more poetic version of Lallā ʿᾹrifā’s
life and spiritual journey is given by Mullā Bahāu’d-Dīn Mattu (d. 1832) in Rishī
namā (composed in 1223/1808). In a section entitled āmdan Ḥaẓrat Lallā ʿᾹrifā
nizd Ḥaẓrat Shaikhu’l Ᾱlam, the Sufi poet compares Lallā to badr-i yakta (full
moon with no parallel) and sar āpā nūr (light from head to foot).180 According
to the sources of the Rishī Sufis of Kashmir, Lallā had a great influence on the
teachings of Shaikh Nūru’d-Dīn (d. 842/1439). Bahāu’d-Dīn Mattu and, later,
Hasan say that Lallā and Ḥaẓrat Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam’s connection began right after
the birth of Shaikhu’l ʿᾹlam when he refused breast milk of his mother and
Lallā offered him her own which he accepted.181 This natural bond and con-
nection grew as both learned from each other. Did she embrace Islam under
the influence of Shaikh Nūru’d-Dīn? This question remains unanswered as
Lallā’s verses speak of her devotion to Shiva. Lallā, however, rejected all forms
of dogmatism and rituals.182 Ghulām Sarwar Lahorī, writing about the virtues
of Lallā, says that as a gnostic she was aware of the matters of heart and of the
state of the dead in their graves (kashfu’l qulūb wa kashfu’l qabūr). According to
a legend described by Ghulām Sarwar Lahorī, Lāl Ded or Lallā ʿᾹrifa, after being
mistreated by her husband and in-laws, in her state of sakr wa jazb wa istighrāq
was roaming naked on the streets. All of a sudden, Shaikh Bulbul Shāh arrived
there.183 Seeing him, Lallā cried out mard āmad, mard āmad (a man has come)
and to shield her naked body leaped into a blazing hot stove. When she came

179 For her life sketch, see Pandit Anand Koul. 1921. “Life sketch of Laleshwari—a great hermi-
tess of Kashmir.” The Indian Antiquary (November 1921), pp. 302–308, and December 1921,
pp. 308–312.
180 Mullā Bahāu’d-Dīn Matu. 1223/1832. Rishī namā (Edited by Muhammad Asadullah Wani
and Masud Samun, Jammu & Kashmir Academy of Art, Culture and Languages, Srinagar,
1982, pp. 73–75).
181 Ibid, p. 73; Ghulām Ḥasan Khuihāmi. 1961. Tārīkh-i Ḥasan. Tazkira-yi Awliyāʾ-yi Kashmir
mausūm ba Isrāru’l akhyār (written in 1305/1888). Srinagar, Kashmir: Research & Pub-
lication Department, Jammu & Kashmir Government. p. 118 (henceforth, referred to as
Tārīkh-i Ḥasan).
182 Richard Carnac Temple. 1924. The Word of Lalla the Prophetess: being the sayings of Lal
Ded or Lal Diddi of Kashmir. Done into English verse from the Lalla-Vakyani. Cambridge
University Press. pp. 190,199.
183 Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyāʾ, jild dom, pp. 424–427; Saiyid Sharfu’d-Dīn ʿAbdur Raḥmān Bulbul
Shāh (d. 727/1326) is said to be the first Muslim to arrive and spread Islam in Kashmir. For
more details, see Nabi Hadi. 1995. Dictionary of Indo-Persian literature. New Delhi: Indira
Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, p. 143; also, Yoginder Sikand. 2000. “Hazrat Bulbul
Shah: The First Muslim Missionary in Kashmir.” Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, 20(2):
361–67.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 249

out, she was fully covered.184 Ghulām Ḥasan Khuihāmi (d. 1898), in his Tārīkh-i
Ḥasan, says that Lallā stands far above and beyond religious polemics and
divides; Lallā, in reality, is one of the special ones of God (khāsān-i khudā ast).185

(10)
Pānch Bībioṅ kā chabūtrā
Period: Fourteenth Century
Place: Bijapur, India

Bībī ʿĀiʾsha, Bībī Amna, Bībī Khadīja, Bībī Maryam, and Bībī Ḥamīda were
the five pious and virtuous sisters of Muntajibu’d-Dīn Zar Zarī Zar Bakhsh
(d. 709/1309) and Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb (d. 738/1337). They travelled from North
India to the Deccan along with their mother, Bībī Hājara.186 As their graves are
built over a slightly raised platform, which in Urdu is called chabūtrā, the graves
are known as five sisters’ chabūtrā. Bībī Hājara, the mother of the five sisters,
locally known as Mā Ṣāḥiba,187 was the sister of Shaikh Jamālu’d-Dīn Hāṅswī188
and Shaikh Sirāju’d-Dīn, who also travelled from Delhi to the Deccan along
with Bībī Hājara and are buried to the northwest of Ḥaẓrat Muntajibu’d-Dīn’s
shrine.189 Bībī Hājara was married to Shaikh Maḥmūd Hāṅswī, a disciple of
Bābā Farīd.
From a reference in Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ it can be inferred that Bībī Hājara trav-
elled with her son Burhānʾud-Din Gharīb. One of the five instructions that
Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ laid upon Burhānʾud-Din was “to give prece-
dence to [your] mother’s happiness over everything else and to reckon it as a
Blessing of Allāh (raḥmat-i ḥaqq).”190 Other than this, information about Bībī
Hājara and her daughters remains hidden. We know more about the death of
the five sisters from their graves; we know almost nothing about their lives.

184 Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyāʾ, jild dom, p. 426.Grierson and Barnett, however, disagree with this ver-
sion and say that it was Sayid ʿAlī Hamadani who arrived in Kashmir in 1380 and stayed for
six years. See Lalla-Vākyāni or the Wise Sayings of Lal Ded, p. 2.
185 Tārīkh-i Ḥasan, p. 560.
186 Rawnaq ʿAlī in his Rawẓatu’l u’l-Aqṭāb says that some sources have named Bībī ʿĀʾisha as
Bībī Sara and Bībī Maryam as Bībī Karīman, pp. 43–44; Among the modern scholars, Carl
Ernst also gives the name of Bībī Sara instead of Bībī Ḥamīda. See Carl W. Ernst. 1992.
Eternal Garden: Mysticism, History, and Politics at a South Asian Sufi Center. Albany: SUNY.
p. 144.
187 Her ʿurs is celebrated on 11 Shawwāl, see Rawẓatu’l u’l-Aqṭāb, p. 50.
188 Ghulām Ᾱzād Bilgrāmī. 1345/1926, Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ al-maʿrūf Nafahātu’l Asfiyā (Urdu
translation by Muḥammad ʿAbdu’l Majīd.) Hyderabad: Maṭbaʿ-i Karīmī, p. 7, footnote 1.
189 Rawẓatu’lu’l-Aqṭāb, p. 45.
190 Rawẓatu’lu’l-Aqṭāb, p. 120.
250 Chapter 9

One can only conjecture that they died young and unmarried. The five sisters,
or the Pānch Bībiaṅ, are buried behind the mosque known as Chaudah sau
awliyāʾoṅ kī masjid (the mosque of fourteen hundred friends of Allāh) and out-
side the tomb of Naṣīru’d-Dīn Pāʾoṇ Payk (d. before 761/1360) in Khuldabād.
This place, being the final place of repose of hundreds of Sufis, mostly of the
Chishtī silsila who came to the Deccan, is considered a highly sanctified space.191
Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb, who rose to great prominence in the Deccan as he
developed strong ties of mutual admiration and respect with the local rulers,
left no record about his sisters.
Today, women devotees lay garlands of fresh flowers and glass bangles at the
shrines of these five sisters in honour of their memory.

(11)
Ḥaẓrat Punch Bībīāṅ Ṣaḥiba
Period: Fourteenth Century
Shrine: Raichur, Karnatka, India
ʿUrs: 16 Rajab al-murajjab

Similar to most accounts of pious women, the story of Punch Bībīāṅ Ṣaḥeba
(five respected women) is wrapped in lore and legends. One such popular leg-
end that has become part of texts relates that a group of five sisters of Saiyyid
lineage, accompanied by their brother and a teacher, arrived in Raichur during
the reign of a Hindu ruler named Raja Hoŕa. They settled on a hilltop where
once stood a small ancient temple with a huge idol carved of stone and now
(in 1829, the time of writing Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur) a huge head of a bull
stood. Perhaps these five women travelled from North India. Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ
and Wāqiʿāt-i Mamlukat-i Bījāpūr identify only three of these five sisters as
Chanda Bī, Gūngī Bī, and Zachcha Bī, and their brother as Chanda Ḥusainī,
all of Saiyyid ancestry; and their teacher (ustād) as Shaikh Rawānī.192 These
three sisters were no ordinary women. They were endowed with the excep-
tional power of flying (marṭab-e ṭairī).193 Five small graves, each measuring

191 Rawnaq ʿAlī quoting the 16th c. manuscript, Fatḥ al-awliyāʾ, says that 700 persons, sev-
eral of them being pālki nishīn (riding palanquins) came to the Deccan, see his Rawẓatu’l
u’l-Aqṭāb, pp. 45–46. Muḥammad Wāḥid Khān. 1913. Chār Chaman Khuldābād Sharīf ma‌ʾ
naqshājāt. Maṭbaʿ Abu’lʿalāiʾ Hyderabad, Deccan, p. 3, 7. Wāqiʿāt-i Mumlakat-i Bījāpūr
(ḥiṣṣā som), p. 212.
192 Not to be confused with Saiyyid Chanda Ḥusainī who migrated to Bidar in the late 15th
century and lies buried at Gogi.
193 It means a miraculous power of flying from one place to another. Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn
Chirāgh Dehli said, ‘when perfection (rūḥ-i-kāmil) is achieved the power of flying
(quwwat-i-ṭairāṅ) is achieved.’ KM, 13th Majlis.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 251

one foot in length, are now the site of great visitation. Interestingly, the mazār
of the mare of Chandā Ḥusainī is also next to these graves. Women who visit
the dargāh tie small pieces of fabric to make vows. The author of Rawẓatu’l
awliyāʾ, writing in the context of his time, says that the leaves of half a portion
of the neem tree standing close to the graves of the sisters were sweet in taste
whereas the leaves of the other half of the same tree were bitter due to the
karāmat of the virtuous and pious women. The ʿurs of Punch Bībīāṅ is held on
the sixteenth of Rajab.194

(12)
Ḥaẓrat Bībī Raushan Ārāʾ
Date: 1279–1342
Place: Kaholia, 24 Pargana, Basirhāt, Bengal, India

Bībī Raushan Ārāʾ, also known as Saiyyida Janāb Khātūn, is one of the first
known women of saintly virtues of Bengal in the first half of the fourteenth
century.195 Local legends narrate that Bībī Raushan Ārāʾ was born in 1279 to
Indian immigrants in Makkah, Mihrʾun-nisāʾ, and Saiyyid Karīmullah. ʿAbbās
ʿAlī, her elder brother, was a man of learning known for his piety and asceti-
cism. Although, there is no evidence, it is assumed that she acquired learning
and knowledge while staying in Makkah. In 1321, at the age of forty-two, she
travelled from Makka to Delhi along with Shaikh Ḥasan Shāh, a Sufi, and her
elder brother and his wife. Delhi at this time was under Sultan Ghiyāsu’d-Dīn
Tughlaq (r. 1320–1325). On his arrival in Delhi, Shaikh Ḥasan Shāh, who was
of the Qādirī silsila of the Sufis, despatched his 125 followers (murīdīn) to dif-
ferent regions of India for the spread of Islam. Raushan Ārāʾ and her brother
were sent to Bengal. They reached Bengal during the time of Ghiyāsu’d-Dīn
Tughlaq’s military expedition (1325–1326) to the region. Pīr Saiyyid ʿAbbās ʿAlī
and Raushan Ārāʾ settled at a place called Taragunia. Saiyyid ʿAbbās ʿAli (or
Saiyyid ʿAbbās Makkī, who also became known as Gorā Chānd Shāh because
of his extremely fair skin) performed several miracles to attract local people to

194 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, p. 255; Waqiʿāt-i Mamlukat-i Bījāpūr (ḥiṣṣā som), pp. 311–312,
347–48. The story of the five sisters is also repeated, word by word, in Tazkira ye Awliya‌ʾ-i
Raichūr by Ḥājī Saiyyid Raushan ʿAlī Qādirī Shaṭṭārī Ṣibghat Allāhī. Maṭbaʿ-i-Sibghat
Allāhī, Raichūr, Hyderabad. 1315/1897, p. 3.
195 Biographical Encyclopaedia of Sufis: South Asia, pp. 328–29.
252 Chapter 9

Islam. It is said that he got involved in a fight and was wounded. Later he died
of these wounds. He was buried at a place called Harua, near Basirhāt.196
Bībī Raushan Ārāʾ, like her brother, attracted local inhabitants to the mes-
sage of Islam. She lived the life of a pious Sufi. Probably she remained celi-
bate. Raushan Ārāʾ died in 1342 at the age of sixty-four and lies buried in her
shrine in the village of Kathulia in Bashirhat at the banks of river Ichhamati.197
She had a large number of women devotees who sought her spiritual bless-
ings to solve their everyday problems.198 Her ʿurs is celebrated in the month of
Chaitra, which is the twelfth month of the Bengali calendar and falls between
the middle of March and the beginning of April. On this occasion, a ten-day-
long fair is held.199
Although Gorā Chānd Shāh and Bībī Raushan Ārāʾ worked for a similar
cause and both migrated to Bengal together, biographical details about Bībī
Raushan Ārāʾ are sparsely recorded.

(13)
Sōnā Bāʾī
Period: Fourteenth Century
Shrine: Bijapur, India

The narratives of the Sufis who travelled from the plains of North India to the
hilly, rocky region of the Deccan in the thirteenth century are a treasure house
of a variety of encounters that resulted in events beyond human comprehen-
sion. Of these encounters, one concerns a bucket of water, a young and charm-
ing princess, and a Sufi who lived surrounded by the Hoda Hill.
Two twentieth-century authors, Rawnaq ʿAli in the early twentieth century
and Wahida Nasīm in 1988, both drawing upon earlier sources which they
have not identified but were greatly familiar with, have described the story
of Sōnā Bāʾī (the woman of gold) and Ḥaẓrat Muntajibu’d-Dīn, known as Zar
Zari Zar-Bakhsh (the giver of gold). According to a legend, Sōnā Bāʾī, whose

196 For further details, see W.W. Hunter. 1875. A Statistical Account of Bengal, vol. 1. (District
of the 24 Parganas and Sundarbans). London: Trübner & Co., pp. 111–12; O’Malley, L.S.S.
1914. Bengal District Gazetteers. 24 Parganas. Calcutta: The Bengal Secretariat Book Depot,
pp. 240–41.
197 Muhammad Abdur Rahim. 1963. Social and Cultural History of Bengal (1201–1576), Vol. 1,
Karachi: Pakistan Historical Society, p. 126; Muhammad Ismail. 2010. Hagiology of Sufi
Saints and the Spread of Islam in South Asia. New Delhi: Jananada Prakashan, p. 174.
198 ʿIjāzu’l Ḥaqq Quddūsi, 1965. Tazkira Ṣūfīyya‌ʾ-yi Bengal. Lahore: Markazi Urdu Board,
p. 185, also see Biographical Encyclopaedia of Sufis: South Asia, p. 328.
199 Amit Dey. 1996. Sufism in India. Calcutta: Ratna Prakashan, pp. 8–10.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 253

father was a local chieftain, had built an underground well or a stepwell

(bauli). When the Chishtī Sufi, Muntajibu’d-Dīn (675/ 1276–709/1390), brother
of Ḥaẓrat Burhānʾud-Din Gharīb, arrived in Khuldabad from Delhi and settled
on the Hoda Hill, this well was in the vicinity. One day he sent a servant to
fetch water for ablutions. When the servant requested access to the well from
an attendant, he was refused. Coincidently, Sōnā Bāʾī happened to be there
with her companions. The fame of Ḥaẓrat Muntajibu’d-Dīn as the giver of gold
was known to Sōnā Bāʾī. Jestingly she suggested that the saint could have water
if he turned the well water into gold. Sōnā Bāʾī was amazed to see that a few
drops of water from the water-soaked handkerchief of Zar Zari Zar-Bakhsh did
turn the water into gold. The legend further says that the dazed Sōnā Bāʾī pre-
sented herself before Zar Zari Zar-Bakhsh and became a Muslim and his fol-
lower and a mystic. She lies buried between the tombs of Zar Zari Zar-Bakhsh
and his mother, Bībī Hājara. Shrine visitors to the tomb of Zar Zari Zar-Bakhsh
also offer prayers at Sōnā Bai’s tomb for whom she is a holy person.200

9.5 Sufi Women of the Fifteenth Century

(1)
An Anonymous Sufi Woman
Period: Fifteenth Century
Place: Bidar, India
Shrine: Bidar

In Bidar: Its History and Monuments, Indian archaeologist Ghulam Yazdani

notes that at a short distance from the domed tomb of Ḥaẓrat Saiyyidʾus-Sādāt
Muḥammad Ḥanīf, a native of Gīlān (d. 901/1496) in Naubād which is close to
Bidar, stands another structure, square in plan, covered by a dome and con-
taining the unmarked grave of a woman. Though nothing is known about the
identity of this pious woman, her grave is visited by the devotees with great rev-
erence. We may surmise that either she was a family member of Muḥammad
Ḥanīf or was spiritually related to him, for two reasons. First, to protect their
modesty, usually women are not buried in close proximity to unrelated men;
and second, because of the similarity of the architecture of the two tombs.
In any case, one can say with some certainty that this anonymous woman

200 Rawnaq ʿAlī. 1908. Rawẓatu’l al-Aqṭāb. p. 5; Wahida Nasīm. 1988. Shahān-i-betāj. Karachi:
Maktabā-yi Asafiya, pp. 67–69; Carl W. Ernst. 1992. Eternal Garden: Mysticism, History, and
Politics at a South Asian Sufi Center. New York: SUNY, pp. 237–238.
254 Chapter 9

belonged to the early group of migrant Muslims who arrived in the Deccan
from North India, or Hindustan, as it was called in the early years of the estab-
lishment of the Delhi Sultanate. It is worth noticing that the domed structure
housing the tomb of Ḥaẓrat Saiyyidʾus-Sādāt also has the tombs of two other
women—his wife and daughter. These tombs are not acknowledged as sacred
spaces by shrine visitors. On the other hand, women had continued to visit
the tomb of this anonymous woman Sufi until the time Yazdani completed his
survey. Women visitors probably find in this unnamed pious Bībī a helper and
a friend.201 A stream running nearby, blessed with the miraculous powers of
either the anonymous Sufi woman or by Ḥaẓrat Saiyyidʾus-Sādāt, is believed to
cure women’s infertility.

(2)
Behat Bībī
Period: Fifteenth Century
Place: Jammu and Kashmir
Shrine: Zalsu (near Charar Sahrif), Jammu and Kashmir

Behat Bībī, along with her sister, Duhat Bībī, was a disciple (murīda) of Ḥaẓrat
Shaikhu’l ʿᾹlam Nūru’d-Dīn Wali, or Nund Rishī (d. 1439).202 Ghulām Ḥasan
Khuihāmi (d. 1898) in his Tārīkh-i Ḥasan’s section on the Sufis of Kashmir,
which is titled as Asrāru’l Akhyār (the secrets of the Chosen Ones), writes that
Behat Bībī’s discourses (kalām) on the Sufi concept of fanāʾ fi’l-lah (absorption
or total annihilation of self-consciousness before arriving in God’s presence)
were of sublime quality. Similarly, her austerity and asceticism (riyāẓat) were
unparalleled.203
Behat Bībī’s journey to the spiritual realm began with what might appear
to a random onlooker as serendipity; to someone steeped with the knowledge
of how our minds work, the story unravels the secrets of Nature. Her father, a
Hindu by faith, was a petty village revenue officer (patwāri) of Duryagām. It is
said that one day Ḥaẓrat Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam passed by the village of Duryagām

201 Bidar, its History and Monuments, pp. 208–11.

202 For the life account of Ḥaẓrat Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam Nūru’d-Dīn Walī, see Ghulām Ḥasan
Khuihāmi. 1961. Tārīkh-i Ḥasan. Tazkira-i Awliya‌ʾ-i Kashmir mausūm ba Isrāru’l akhyār
(written in 1305/1888). Srinagar, Kashmir: Research & Publication Department, Jammu
& Kashmir Government, pp. 116–28. (Henceforth, referred to as Tārīkh-i Ḥasan); Anand
Koul, Pandit. 1929. “A Life of Nand Rishi,” The Indian Antiquary, vol. 58(October): 194–
198 and (December): 221–224; Saiyyid Muhammad Yusuf Bukhari. 1999. Tazkira Ṣūfiya‌ʾ-i
Kashmir. Lahore: Oriental College, pp. 128–36.
203 Tārīkh-i Ḥasan, pp. 145–46.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 255

where Behat Bībī and her sister, Duhat Bībī, were collecting some greens.
Listening to the conversation between the two sisters, the Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam was
astonished (mutanabbih shud) and stopped from walking around. The Shaikh
asked the girls why they were taking the lives of greens and vegetables as they
also have life (kāh sabzā jāndār ast). Behat Bībī responded that they were cut-
ting the grass and vegetables for the benefit of feeding themselves and their
animals. She told the Shaikh that, on the contrary, “you, by striking your staff
(bāẓarb-i ʿaṣā-yi khud), kill thousands of lives, and by sitting at various places
destroy hundreds of lives.” Hearing these words, the Shaikh began to cry (giryā
amad). It is said that after this, he gave up wandering around and sat down (pas
az āṅ raftan wa sair kardan wa bar zamin nishastan tark farmūd).204 At this
time, while the conversation was taking place, suddenly the Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam’s
spiritual gaze (nazr-i raḥmat) fell upon them and they converted to Islam.
Since then, the two of them always remained in his service (dar ḥuzūr mī
būdand) and engaged in prayers and worship (riyāẓat wa ʿibādat). Thus, Ḥasan
Khuihāmi comments, the two sisters attained the highest station (rutba‌ʾ-i ʿālī).
It is said that for a long period of time, Behat Bībī used to work (kasb-i khud)
to earn her bread, and always commented on the benefits of self-earning. She
used to say that human existence is the greatest veil between God and human
beings (wajūd-i bandā parda-i ʿaẓīm ast miyān-i bandā wa khudā). Like a true
Sufi, she counselled that to attribute success to human action is the greatest act
of polytheism (wajūd-i khud dar kārhā maujūd pindāshtund shirk-iʿazīm ast).
She is buried in Zalsu, a small village in Kashmir.205

(3)
Duhat Bībī
Period: Fifteenth Century
Place: Budgam, Jammu and Kashmir
Shrine: Zalusa, near Charar-i Sharīf

Duhat Bībī, like her sister Behat Bībī, discussed above, was a disciple (murīda)
of Ḥaẓrat Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam Nūru’d-Dīn Wali, or Nund Rishī (d. 1439). Ghulām
Ḥasan Khuihāmi, the author of the lives of Sufis of Kashmir, however, says that
according to some historians the two were not real sisters but only had sis-
terly relations.206 In her state and virtues (ḥālāt wa kamālāt), Duhat Bībī pos-
sessed excellence. In her discourses and conversations, she always had sublime

204 Ibid, p. 123.

205 Ibid. p. 146.
206 Ibid, pp. 146–47.
256 Chapter 9

expressions. It is narrated that once Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam Nūru’d-Dīn Wali and Mīr
Muḥammad Hamadānī (774/1372–852/1448) had a meeting.207 Mīr Muḥammad
Hamadānī, referring to the lean and weak physical condition of Shaikhu’l
ʿĀlam, asked him by means of an allegory, “Why have you kept your horse so
lean and weak?” To this, the Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam answered, “I seldom ride it as I am
afraid that if the horse is strong and healthy, taking advantage of my weakness,
it would throw me down.” Here, the Shaikh meant that a well-fed body would
defeat the soul. During this conversation, Duhat Bībī and Behat Bībī were
present. Duhat Bībī, intervening in the conversation, said, “Those who have
reached their destination (manzil rasīdgān) are not worried either about their
horse or its saddle ( fikr-i markab wa maḥmil na mi bāshad).” “Who are these
who have attained their goal?” enquired Mīr Muḥammad Hamadānī. “They
are the ones who have freed and liberated themselves from the self (az khud
rastagān),” answered Duhat Bībī. “Are you one of these?” asked Hamadānī. She
explained that if she were not, how could she be present at this august assem-
bly (majlis-i ʿālī) and take part in a discussion regarding the secrets of Allāh
(maḥram-i asrār). On being asked by Mīr Muḥammad Hamadānī whether she
was a daughter or a son, Duhat Bībī’s answer was, “If I am not (agar nīst) I’m
neither a daughter nor a son; if I exist, I’m nothing (agar hast bāsham, pas hech
nīstam).” The conversation turned towards meat-eating. Duhat Bībī argued
that meat-eating might be permissible to the walīs, however, as she has not
attained that rank, she considers it not permissible for herself. Duhat Bībī was
buried in Zalusa in Kashmir.208

(4)
Mīrā Bībī
Period: Fifteenth Century
Place: Gamru, Jammu and Kashmir

A short biographical notice on Mīrā Bībī is found only in Ghulām Ḥasan

Khuihāmi’s (d. 1898) Tārīkh-i Ḥasan: Tazkira-yi Awliyāʾ-yi Kashmir mausūm
ba Isrāru’l akhyār (written in 1305/1888).209 He writes that Mīrā Bībī was a
perfect gnostic (ʿārifa kāmila) and was the disciple of Ḥaẓrat Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam
Nūru’d-Dīn Walī, or Nund Rishī (d. 842/1439). For her whole life, she lived in

207 For a biographical notice on Mīr Muḥammad Hamadānī, see Tārīkh-i Ḥasan, pp. 23–26.
208 For Duhat Bībī’s conversation see, Mohammad Ishaq Khan. 1994. Kashmir’s Transition to
Islam: The Role of Muslim Rishis (Fifteenth to Eighteenth Century). New Delhi: Manohar,
pp. 246–47.
209 Tārīkh-i Ḥasan, p. 257.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 257

retirement and seclusion (dar khilwat wa inziwāʾ) and did not show her face
at all to any strangers or unrelated persons (ghair maḥram rā ruʾ-i khud nishān
nami dād). Wild beasts and fierce animals were her companions (anīs-i o
būdand). For her livelihood, she earned money by spinning thread (tār-i sūt).
Most of the time, however, she remained lost in Allāh’s remembrance (dar
istighrāq).
She lies buried in the village of Gamru, close to Khuihāma, the birthplace of
Ghulām Ḥasan Khuihāmi.

9.6 Sufi Women of the Sixteenth Century

(1)
Bībī Fāṭima Saiyyida Gilānī
Date: D. 1016/1607
Place: Lahore
Shrine: 1 Link Road, Lahore, Pakistan
ʿUrs: 23, 24 Rabiʿ-us sānī

Saiyyida Bībī Fāṭima, popularly addressed as Bībī Kalāṅ (the first or the elder
lady) or Bībī Waddi (the elder lady) by her devotees in the Punjabi language,
was the wife of Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Muḥammad Shāh Bukhārī, known as Mauj Daryā
Bukhārī (d. 1014/1605). Ḥaẓrat Mauj Daryā was one of the descendants of Ḥaẓrat
Shaikh Jalālu’d-Dīn Surkh Bukhārī (d. 690/1291).210 Ḥaẓrat Mauj Daryā was a
contemporary of Emperor Akbar who conferred upon him several land grants,
including the land on which his shrine and that of his wife, Bībī Kalāṇ, stands
today.211 The couple had one son, Saiyyid Ṣafiu’d-Dīn. Bībī Fāṭima was one of
the glorious descendants (awlad-i amjad) of Sādāt-i Gilānī. Her father, Saiyyid
ʿAbdu’l Qādir Sālis bin Saiyyid Muḥammad Bālā Pīr Gīlānī, was also a pious
person. Bībī Kalāṇ was a highly reverential person and a devout, God-fearing
ascetic (baghāyat buzurg ʿābida wa zāhida wa muttaqīyya). She inherited the

210 Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyya‌ʾ, jild dom, pp. 91–92; Ḥadīqatu’l Awliyā, ʾ pp. 169–70; Ghulām Sarwar
Lahorī, 1877. Tārīkh-i Makhzan-i Panjāb. Lucknow: Nawal Kishore Press. (Henceforth,
referred to as Tārīkh-i Makhzan-i Panjāb), p. 523.
211 Akbar developed great faith in the mystical powers of Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Muḥammad Shāh
Bukhārī as it was thought that the conquest of Chittor happened because of his prayers.
See, Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyya‌ʾ, jild dom, p. 91. Recently there was a dispute over this land.
See “Emperor Akbar stands in the way of Orange Line”—The Nation: nation.com.pk/
lahore/14-Jul-2016/emperor-akbar-stands-in-the-way-of-orange-line.
258 Chapter 9

miraculous powers, charisma, and nobility (khwāriq wa karamāt wa sharāfat)

of her father and ancestors.
Several miracles are associated with Saiyyidā Bībī Fāṭima. According to one
legend, once her blessed headscarf (ridā-yi mubārak) fell off while perform-
ing ablution for the ʿasr prayer. As the scarf was soiled by mud, Bībī Fāṭima,
doubting its cleanliness (ridā-i mubārak mashkūk shud), washed it at once. The
sun was already going down, so drying the wet scarf was not easy. A little sun-
light was still at the top branches of the jujube tree standing in her courtyard.
Since it was not proper for a veiled woman to climb a tree, she commanded
the tree to bow down its branches. The tree obeyed at once. Once the Bībī
spread her scarf on the branches, the tree straightened up. According to this
legend, when Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Bukhārī saw that his wife’s scarf was floating on
top of the branches, acting in the pattern of a jealous husband who guards his
wife’s chastity and seclusion, he became annoyed. He assumed that the Bībī
must have climbed up the tree, and thus breached the code of female honour.
Uttering furious words (kalimāt-i ghazab āmez), he demanded an explanation.
Saiyyidā Bībī Fāṭima vowed that she did not climb the tree but the tree itself
bowed down (darakht sar past kard). The Bībī’s story did not pacify him and
he then demanded that she should get the scarf down the way she described
putting it up in the treetop. The Bībī approached the tree and ordered it to bow
down, which it did. Witnessing this great charisma of his wife, Ḥaẓrat Mauj
Daryā wanted to know how she came to possess such status (rutbā). To this
she simply answered, “This ancestral fortune (daulat-i mawrūsī) belongs to
my ancestors (ābā-yi man).”212 Nūr Aḥmad Chishtī, without citing any sources,
writes that the Bībī, much grieved at this lack of trust of her husband, did not
remain silent but retorted that in each community there exist special and ordi-
nary persons. Chiding her husband, she told him that there was no reason for
his anger. She also said that from that day onwards there would be no family
connections between the Sādāt-i Bukhārī (her family) and the Gilānī (her hus-
band’s family). Nūr Aḥmad Chishtī comments that this ban continues to exist
today.213
Saiyyidā Bībī Fāṭima left this world in 1016/1607 and lies buried adjacent to
the shrine of her husband in Lahore. On my visit to the shrine of Bībī Kalāṅ in
February 2016, I found a padlock on the entrance to the shrine. I had to look
around for the caretaker of the shrine and found him with the help of people

212 Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyya‌ʾ, jild dom, pp. 427–28; Ḥadīqat-ul Awliyāʾ, p. 242; The story of Saiyyidā
Bībī Fāṭima is replicated in several Urdu books. For instance, see Pīr Ghulām Dastgīr
Nāmī. Buzurgān-i-Lahore. (Nūrī Book Depot, Lahore: 1966), p. 245.
213 Nūr Aḥmad Chishtī Lahorī. Taḥqiqāt-i Chishtī. (Maṭbaʿ Koh-i nūr (first published in 1867),
Lahore: 1927), p. 343.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 259

of the neighbourhood. After an hour or so, the man finally appeared and let
us inside the shrine after some arguments. In the meantime, I took a walk
around the shrine premises and found that there were several other graves.
The man with the keys told me that the keys are deposited with the manage-
ment of a madrassa situated close to the shrine. The shrine is opened for the
devotees only on Thursdays from eight in the morning until seven in the eve-
ning. This person also told me that since the last khādim (shrine’s caretaker),
one Ḥāji Barkat, the shrine has had no khādim. A roadside niche, blackened
with soot, serves the needs of those who visit the shrine to make oblation and
offer prayers on days other than Thursday. A few earthen lamps, some burning
brightly and others with no flickers, were resting on a brick-built slab. A small
toy wooden crib was hanging by a nail. This small makeshift shrine extension
needs much cleaning as plastic bottles, bottle lids, and burnt matchsticks were
strewn all over this tiny place, making it unworthy of a sacred place.
Entrance to the shrine of Bībī Kalāṅ is through a single door, which opens
into a square chamber covered by a domed ceiling. On the upper side of the
main doorway, under the arch, an inscription reads Kalima, the Ᾱyat al-Kursi
(Qurʾān: 255) and the names of the first four Caliphs of Islam. Underneath this,
an inscription in Urdu offers information that is missing in the texts and indeed
serves as a biographical notice about Bībī Kalāṅ. The first line says Saiyyida
Bībī Fāṭima sānī,214 which means that Bībī Kalāṅ is the eldest wife of Ḥaẓrat
Mirāṅ Muḥammad Shāh Bukhārī. The name of another woman, Bībī Naurang,
is marked with the numeral “2” without saying that she was the second wife.
The next line under the heading of the Sufis of Uchch Sharīf (the noble city
of Uchch) gives a list of the Shaikhs beginning with Saiyyid Jalālu’d-Dīn Mīr
Surkh Bukhārī (d. 1291), Ḥaẓrat Makhdūm Jalālu’d-Dīn Jahāṅiyaṅ Jahāṅgasht
(d. 1384), and Saiyyid Ḥaṣanu’d-Dīn, and ending with Shaikh ʿAbdu’l Qādir
Jīlāni. The last line gives the most important information saying that Bībī
Fāṭima sānī had attended the status of wilāyat.
The shrine chamber with the grave of Saiyyidā Bībī Fāṭima had an aura of
sanctity. The ostentatious, splashy red synthetic grave-cover sheet with arti-
ficial golden tassels and an artificial garland of synthetic flowers presented a
sharp contrast to the life of Saiyyidā Bībī Fāṭima. I wondered whether those
who draped her grave in those colourful shiny tinsels knew that this woman
had only one scarf and had to wash off the dirt from it so that she could cover
her head for offering her ʿaṣr prayer. Unlike several other shrines I have visited,
this one was unique in the sense that there were no visitors or devotees present.

214 Sānī means the second, thus in honour of Ḥaẓrat Fāṭima, the beloved daughter of the
Prophet, traditionally pious Muslims used the term to show that the person is not the real
(Ḥaẓrat) Fāṭima but a second one.
260 Chapter 9

Figure 5 Shrine of Bībī Fāṭima Saiyyida Gilānī, 1 Link Road, Lahore

Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 261

(2)
Bībī Fāṭima
Shrine: Bidar, India

Ghulam Yazdani in his report on the monuments of Bidar, Bidar, Its History and
Monuments, mentions that close to the grave of Shaikh Badru’d-Dīn Qādirī,215
the fourth son of Multānī Padshāh (1458–1529),216 there stands another tomb
structure, square in plan. A polished casket of black stone with a tablet (takhtī)
shows that this was probably the tomb of a woman. A stone tablet fixed above
the doorway shows that it is the grave of Bībī Fāṭima. Neither Yazdani nor any
other source gives further details about Bībī Fāṭima.217

(3)
Gangā Bībī
Period: Early Sixteenth Century
Shrine: Handwanpura in Ḥamal, Jammu and Kashmir

Gangā Bībī was the wife of Bābā Langar Mall, a person of immense wealth and
a tyrant by nature who lived a life of luxury in Ḥamal.218 It is said that once he
came to pay his respects to Bābā Lidā Mall Rishī,219 who had forsaken worldly
pleasures and lived a life of total austerity as a devoted disciple of Zainu’d-Dīn
Rishī. To Bābā Lidā Mall several miracles are ascribed. Of these miracles, the
most significant one is the conversion of Bābā Langar Mall and his wife, Ganga,
from their life of riches to self-chosen poverty and asceticism. It is said that
when Langar Mall, dressed in his finest clothes, went to see Bābā Lidā Mall, the
Bābā refused to see him, saying that he would have nothing to do with a person
of worldly pleasures. These words hit Langar Mall so deeply and intensely that
he gave up all wealth and adopted the life of poverty. His wife, Gangā Bībī, also
followed him. So great was her renunciation that she not only repented but
became a complete recluse. She fasted frequently and for long periods of time,
breaking only occasionally. According to Ghulām Ḥasan Khuihāmi, she would
only eat once a year (bʿād yak sāl ifṭār mi kard). Her piety and munificence

215 For a short note on Shaikh Badru’d-Dīn Qādirī, see Bidar, its History and Monuments,
p. 199.
216 Abu’l Fatḥ Shamsu’d-Dīn Muḥammad al-Qādirī, known as Multānī Padshāh because of
his Multan ancestry was one of the most popular Sufis of Bidar, see Bidar, its History and
Monuments, pp. 107–9; Barakātu’l Awliyāʾ, p. 134.
217 Ibid, p. 199.
218 For biographical notice on Bābā Langar Mall, see Tārīkh-i Ḥasan. p. 167.
219 For biographical notice on Bābā Lidā Mall Rishī, see Ibid, pp. 166–67.
262 Chapter 9

were so great that she is said to have constructed several mosques and repaired
several bridges with her own self-earned money (kasb-i khud). When her hus-
band, after giving up his worldly pursuits, retired to a cave in the Dandakvan
mountains, she used to fetch water in a pitcher for his ablutions. On her way,
wild beasts would not harm her but would instead run away as soon as they
saw her approaching.
A few days before her passing, she said she would die on a Thursday and
should be buried on Friday. Her words came true as she died on a Thursday.
Gangā Bībī, along with her husband, rests in the enclosure of her spiritual pre-
ceptor, Bābā Lidā Mall, at Handwanpura in Ḥamal.220

(4)
Harro Bībī
Period: Early Sixteenth Century
Shrine: Mcleod Road, Lahore, Pakistan
ʿUrs: 17–18 Safar

The life of Harro Bībī is part of a legend that has survived through centuries. She
lies buried in a small tomb within the complex of the shrine of Shaikh Mūsā
Āhangar Suhrawardī, a late fifteenth-century Suhrawardī Sufi who lived in the
time of Sultan Bahlol Lodi (d. 1489) of the Delhi Sultanate. Shaikh Mūsā Āhangar
(d. 925/1519) was a khalifā of Ḥaẓrat Shaikh ʿAbdul Jalīl Chauhaŕ Bandagī (d.
910/1505).221 Earlier, he was a disciple of Shahrullah bin Yusuf, sajjādā-nishin
of the shrine of Shaikh Bahāʾu’d-Dīn Zakarīyya (1182–1262). Ghulām Sarwar
Lahorī describes Shaikh Mūsā as one of the noted Sufis (az awliyāʾ ye nāmdār)
and as one of the deputies of Ḥaẓrat Shaikh ʿAbdul Jalīl with an awakened
heart (dil-i bedār).222 Heavy bodied (sāḣ ib-i jasīm), Shaikh Mūsā was an iron-
monger (āhangar) by profession and a Sufi by devotion. Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf,
in his Bahr-e Zakhkhār (the rising ocean), a late eighteenth-century biographi-
cal dictionary of South Asian Sufis and mystics, eulogizes Shaikh Mūsā as ahl-i
kamāl lāraib (one who entertained, no doubt [about Divine Glory]), wāqif-i
asrār-i-ghaib (knower of the secrets of the Unseen), and sāḥib-iʿirfān (master
of gnosis).223

220 Tārīkh-i Ḥasan, pp. 167–68.

221 For an account of Ḥaẓrat Shaikh ʿAbdul Jalīl Chauhaŕ Bandagī, see Ḥaqīqat ul Awliyāʾ,
pp. 160–61.
222 Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyya‌ʾ, jild dom. p. 80.
223 Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf. Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, p. 227–28.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 263

According to a legend described by Ghulām Sarwar Lahorī, one day an

exceedingly beautiful (benazīr) Hindu woman named Harro came to his work-
shop of iron mongering to get her iron spindle (dok-i- āhani) repaired. Edward
Eastwick, an English orientalist, diplomat, and politician, recounts the legends
that say it was not a spindle but her milk can that she came to get repaired.224
While the Shaikh was preparing to do the work for her, he got lost in gazing
at her face and forgot to take the spindle out of the furnace (kūzā-i ātish). At
this, the woman got enraged and angrily told him that she came to get her
spindle mended and instead he was staring at her. The Shaikh explained he
was not staring at her but was “paying tribute to the One who creates your
beauty. To show you that I have no improper thoughts, I will draw the red-hot
iron across my eyes. If I am guilty, I may lose my eyesight. If I do not, you will
know that I am innocent.” As he spoke these words, the miracle happened.
The Shaikh’s eyes remained unharmed. Seeing this miracle, Harro Bībī lost
her senses and was overpowered by the Magnificence of the Creator (mastānā
jām-i- ʿishq-i-ilāhī). Like a person who has lost sanity (dīwānāwār), she ran out
and began roaming around the streets and markets. Her relatives, watching
this condition, caught hold of her and put her in chains. Harro Bībī’s faith in
the power of the Unseen remained steadfast. Soon, she passed away. While her
relatives were getting ready for her funeral rites, news of her death reached
Shaikh Mūsā Āhangar. He arrived there soon and, addressing the supposedly
dead Harro Bībī, commanded they stop the funeral saying that this one killed
by the love of the Almighty might be alive (zindā). As soon as the word “alive”
was uttered, Harro Bībī got up. The anecdote says that thereafter she became
a disciple of the Shaikh.225 A tablet on the outside wall of the Shaikh’s shrine
says that he permitted her burial within his shrine.
On my visit to the shrine on Mcleod Road, Lahore,226 in 2016, I met with sev-
eral women devotees and men standing around the shrine who told me that
following the demise of Shaikh Mūsā Āhangar, his devotees appointed Harro
Bībī as his Khalifa. On Thursdays and on the ʿurs, so many women visit Harro
Bībī’s shrine that it is hard to even find a place to stand there.

224 Edward Backhouse Eastwick. 1883. Handbook of the Punjab, Western Rajputana, Kashmir,
and Upper Sindh. London: J. Murray, p. 198.
225 Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyya‌ʾ, jild dom, pp. 80–82; Pīr Ghulām Dastgīr Nāmī. 1966. Buzurgān-i
Lahore. Lahore: Nūri Book Depot, p. 129.
226 Earlier, this area was known as Thatti Mehtran (the sweepers’ quarters), see Syad
Muhammad Latif. 1892. Lahore: its history, architectural remains and antiquities, with an
account of its modern institutions, inhabitants, their trade, customs, &c. Lahore: Printed at
the New Imperial Press. P. 203.
264 Chapter 9

Figure 6 Shrine of Harro Bībī, Mcleod Road, Lahore

Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 265

Figure 7 Wall inscription in Urdu declaring that Harro Bībī was a disciple of Shaikh Mūsā
Āhangar (d. 925/1519)

The brick-built shrine of Shaikh Mūsā Āhangar is considered one of the best
specimens of early sixteenth-century Indo-Islamic art traditions with its sur-
face decorations, tilework, and beautiful dome.227 To reach the actual tomb
of Harro Bībī, a visitor has to go down a steep staircase to a dark underground
chamber lighted by an oil lamp. The tomb next to her is said to be that of her
daughter. Some others say it is of her mother. On my visit, I saw that the tomb
of Harro Bībī was in a much-neglected state. Down the narrow staircase, the
room was in a shabby state, brooms were lying in one corner, and drippings
from the oil lamps had blackened some portions of the wall. Broken plastic
bottles and earthen oil lamps were scattered around. The grave, however, was
covered with fresh rose petals. Looking at the neglected state of the shrine,

227 For its architectural significance, see Shaikh Khurshid Hasan, 2001. The Islamic Archi-
tectural Heritage of Pakistan: Funerary Memorial Architecture. Karachi: Royal Book Co.;
J.S. Grewal. 1975. In the By-lanes of history: Some Persian Documents from a Punjab Town.
Simla: Indian Institute of Advanced Study; Jonathan Bloom and Sheila Blair. 2009. The
Grove Encyclopedia of Islamic art and architecture. Oxford: Oxford University Press; Yas-
meen Lari. 2003. Lahore: illustrated city guide. Karachi: Heritage Foundation Pakistan;
also, Clifford Edmund Bosworth. 1986. The Encyclopaedia of Islam. 5, 5., Leiden: E.J. Brill,
p. 600.
266 Chapter 9

built in the memory of a woman whose beauty made a Sufi lose touch with his
surroundings, is nothing less than irony.

(5)
Hasti Bībī
Period: Sixteenth Century
Shrine: Tilak Road, near Bhadra Fort, Ahmadabad, India

Little is known about the life of Hasti Bībī (the laughing lady).228 It is said that
she was a family member of Ḥaẓrat Shaikh bin ʿAbdullāh al-Edrūs (1513–1582),
a Sufi of Yemeni (Hadhramaut) origin and the founder of the Edrūsiya silsila of
the Sufis who arrived in 1552 in Ahmadabad.229 To her votaries this knowledge
is of no concern as her shrine, despite its modest appearance, attracts large
number of devotees who come to seek her blessings.
The shrine was first noticed by James Burgess in 1878–1889 while compiling
a list of antiquities and dilapidated monuments of the Bombay Presidency. In
the city of Ahmadabad—built by Sultan Aḥmad in 1412 and later improved by
the other Bigarah rulers—the survey team found several such remains, includ-
ing tombs, mosques, shrines, and other historical remains, some dating back
to the pre-Muslim era as well. Among these findings, one was the shrine, or
gokhlo as called in the local language, of Hasti Bībī. Lying in a predominantly
Jain neighbourhood, close to Manek Chawk near Rani no Hajiro (the Rani’s
tomb), the shrine attracts large number of devotees, both Muslims and Hindus,
who come to laugh out their worries and anxieties. This shrine, unlike the
usual shrines built over a marked space with entrance doorways and grave, is
what Esther David describes as a “quaint shrine,” built as a small marble cavity
in the back wall of a shop and lighted by a small lamp.230 The flickering light of
the clay lamp and the fragrance of roses and mogra flowers take away the pains

228 James Burgess and Henry Cousens. 1897. Revised lists of antiquarian remains in the Bombay
Presidency, and the native states of Baroda, Palanpur, Radhanpur, Kathiawad, Kachh,
Kolhapur, and the southern Maratha minor states. Bombay: Printed at the Government
Central Press; Michelle L. Stefano, Peter Davis, and Gerard Corsane. 2012. Safeguarding
intangible cultural heritage touching the intangible. Woodbridge: Boydell & Brewer, p. 87.
229 For short biographical notice on Ḥaẓrat Shaikh bin ʿAbdullah al-Edrūs, see Barakātu’l
Awliyāʾ, p. 167. Gulshanābādī, however, gives 1591 as the date of his demise. For the arrival
of Sufis from Hadhramaut, see Omar Khalid. 2004. “Saiyyid of Hadhramaut in Early
Modern India.” Asian Journal of Social Science, 32 (3): 329–352.
230 Esther David. 2016. Ahmedabad: City with a Past. Noida: Harper Collins Publishers India
(no page numbers).
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 267

and aches of many a devotee who come to seek her blessings, particularly on
Thursday nights.231

(6)
Bībī Mahkalī
Period: Late Sixteenth Century
Place: Qaṣūr, Punjab, India

Shaikh Ghulām Muʿīnu’d-Dīn ʿAbdu’llah, known as al-Khalīfa al-Kheshgī

al-Chishtī, is the only author who has introduced Bībī Mahkalī to us. His two
manuscripts—Akbāru’l awliyāʾ min lisānu’l aṣfiyyāʾ (Tales of friends of God as
a tribute to the pure ones), which was probably completed in 1077/1666–1667,
and Maʿāriju’l wilāyat (the spread of Sufism), completed in 1094/1683—are the
only sources on the life of Bībī Mahkalī. The following account is based on the
narratives of these two sources.
Bībī Mahkalī, known for her piety and saintly virtues, was of Kheshgī descent
and belongs to the ʿAzīzyāṅ Afghānī clan. In Qaṣūr, she lived in ʿAzīzyāṅ, a
locality named after her clan. In her piety and virtuous living, she was similar
to Rābiʿa al-ʿAdawiyya. Another saintly person, Miyāṅ Akhund Saʿīd,232 used
to visit her frequently in order to serve her (ba-mulāzamat Bībī bisyār mīraft).
People objected to these visits and told him, “O’ Miyān! considering your hal-
lowed and dignified status (shān-i wilayat) it is not appropriate for you to be
close to an old woman (ʿajūza).” Miyāṅ Akhund Saʿīd told them, “O’ ignorant
ones (nadān)! Don’t say this because Bībī Mahkalī is one of the gnostic, pious,
and learned women of her times (az ʿārifāt wa ṣāliḥāt wa faẓliāt). When God
distributed (taqsīm) greatness, blessings, holiness and miracles (buzurgī wa
barakāt wa wilāyat wa karamāt) upon the Kheshgīs, one entire part of it was
bestowed upon her (yak ḥiṣṣa tamām) and the remaining two parts were given
to the rest of the people.”233
Another story is about her fortitude, patience, and trust in God. It is said that
when the Bībī had a stillborn son ( farzand-i murda), she did not shed a tear at

231 Hasti Bibi likes jalebis | India News—Times of India.

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com › News › India News › Hasti Bibi likes jalebis.
232 ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī. 1094/1683. Maʿāriju’l wilāyat, MS. No. R344, Iqbal Mujaddidī
Collection, Punjab University, Lahore. Fol.375b; Khazīnatu’l Asfiyā, jild awwal, p. 454.
Miyān Akhund Saʿīd Shuryānī (d. 1018/1609) is said to have received his khirqa (cloak)
from ʿAbul Ḥasan Kharaqani (d. 1033). For al-Kharaqani, see Hujwīrī Alí ibu Usmān, and
Reynold Alleyne Nicholson. 1911. Kashfu’l-Mahjūb: p. 163; Shuryanis belong to the Kheshgī
clan. See Tarikh-i-Khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i-Afghānī, p. 579.
233 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fols. 123b, 124a.
268 Chapter 9

her loss and did not lament (har giz giryā wa nauḥa na kard). At this, people
around her commented, “Oh Bībī! Your beloved son ( farzand-i arjumand) was
born dead and even then you are not lamenting and grieving!” At this, she only
said, “Why should a person who has despatched her own son to serve her (ba
jihat khidmat-i khud), weep (giryā)?” She then quoted the Prophet’s blessed
Tradition that whoever in his community would have two stillborn ( farṭ),
Allāh would reward them with Heaven. Finally, she told the curious people,
“Although to you my son is invisible (ghāʿib), for me, he is present (ḥāzir ast).”234
Kheshgī in Maʿāriju’l wilāyat narrates another conversation of Miyāṅ
Akhund Saīd about the spiritual excellence of Bībī Mahkalī. He used to say
that if anyone tried to find a Sufi woman, he/she would find none except Bībī
Mahkalī. He also used to say that “Mahkalī is a man born into the form of a
woman (Mahkalī mard ast ki dar qālib-i ʿaurat barāmad). Because her supplica-
tions are heard and answered and therefore for this reason we ask her to pray
for us.”235

(7)
Bībī Māhnau
Period: Sixteenth Century
Place: Kolhuaban, Azamgarh, UP, India

A hagiographical narrative places a princess in a Sufi abode in the woods

of Kolhuaban in the pargana Nathupur, Azamgarh. This princess was Bībī
Māhnau (the new moon), daughter of Emperor Sher Shāh Suri (d. 1545) and
the disciple of Sufi Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā of the Madārī silsila. Hagiographical
accounts ascribe that Sher Shāh Suri made a vow to offer his first child, whether
a boy or a girl, to serve for life Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā.
Exceptionally incredible charismatic tales associated with Saiyyid Aḥmad
Bādpā and his spiritual mentor Shāh Badīʿu’d-Dīn Quṭbu’l-quṭṭāb al-madār nar-
rate that once when the Aleppo-born Shāh Madār (d. 840/1436), during his
long travels, arrived in Baghdad, he met with Shaikh ʿAbdu’l Qādir Jilānī.236 A
biographical compendium of Badīʿu’d-Dīn Madār and of his khulafāʾ writ-
ten in 1292/1875 by Maulawī Saiyyid Muḥammad Amīr Ḥasan Madārī
al-Fansūrī, a resident of Makanpur and a devotee of Shāh Madār, describes the

234 Ibid.
235 Maʿāriju’l Wilāyat. MS no. R344, fols. 653a &b.
236 For the biography Shāh Badīʿu’d-Dīn Madār, see ʿAbduʾr Raḥmān Chishtī. 2011. Mirāt-i
Madārī. Sidharathnagar: al-majmā. For short notices, AA, pp. 158–59; Azkār-i abrār,
pp. 74–75; Mirātu’l asrār, pp. 1096–97.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 269

fascinating anecdote of Badīʿu’d-Dīn Madār’s meeting with Saiyyid Aḥmad

Bādpā. Al-Fansurī writes that Shaikh ʿAbdu’l Qādir Jilānī handed over Saiyyid
Muḥammad Jamālu’d-Dīn and Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā, the sons of his sister
Naṣībā Bībī, to Shāh Badīʿu’d-Dīn Madār with instructions to take care of them.
Shāh Madār brought the boys with him to India.237
Mirāt-i Madārī, recounting the virtues and righteousness of Saiyyid Aḥmad
Bādpā, a disciple and spiritual successor of Ḥaẓrat Quṭbu’l Madār Badīʿu’d-Dīn
Madār, says that he was unrivalled in the realm of travelling and miraculous
flying (dar ʿālam-i sair wa tair bi nazīr būd).238 Al-Fansūrī refers to his strange
(ʿajīb wa ghaīb) extreme ascetic feats, for instance, that for forty years (some
accounts say twelve years) he remained standing only on his left foot (bar pā-i
chap īstādā).239
After the death of Badīʿu’d-Dīn Madār in 838/1434, Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā,
also known as Miran Shāh, settled at Kolhuaban in Mau in the Azamgarh
district.240 He died there and was buried in his dargāh in pargana Nathupur.
An early twentieth-century account notes that the ʿurs festival of Saiyyid
Aḥmad Bādpā lasts for six weeks with celebrations held on seven consecutive
Thursdays, beginning with the last Thursday of the month of Jeth.241
Saiyyid Shafīq Aḥmad, sajjadānishin of the dargāh of Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā,
in a slim thirty-two-page Urdu booklet titled Tazkira Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā
(n.d.), with the help of documents in the custody of the shrine of Aḥmad
Bādpā, recounts the incredible story of Māhnau who voluntarily chose pov-
erty and gave up all worldly comforts. Shafīq Aḥmad writes that in Kolhuaban,
Farid Khan, the future Emperor Sher Shāh Suri, while still a student visited
Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā. Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā prophesied that one day Farīd
would become a king. He also told Farīd Khan that on becoming king, he
should offer his firstborn to him. On capturing Delhi, Sher Shāh revisited
Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā who reminded him of his promise and enquired why he
had not brought his daughter Māhnau. Sher Shāh submitted that he had not

237 Maulawī Saiyyid Muḥammad Amīr Ḥasan Madārī al-Fanṣūrī. 1315/1898. Tazkiratu’l
Muttaqīn fi aḥwāl khulafā’ Saiyyid Badīʿu’d-dīn. Kanpur: Maṭbaʿ-i ʿAzīzī, pp. 8–11, 43–44;
also, Zahīr Aḥmad Zahīrī Sahaswānī. 1900. Siyaru’l madār maʿrūf zahīru’l abrār. Lucknow:
Nawal Kishore, pp. 17–20; Qazi Athar Mubarakpurī rejects this story as a fabricated
account. See Maulānā Qāẓī Athar Mubarakpurī. “Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā.” Maʿarif,
January 1990, pp. 5–27.
238 Mirāt-i Madārī, p. 131, 159, 179.
239 Tazkiratu’l Muttaqīn, p. 44.
240 Ibid, p. 44.
241 D.L. Drake-Brockman. 1911. Azamgarh: A Gazetteer, vol. 33. Allahabad: Superintendent
Government Press, p. 65. Jeth or Jyaistha is the third month of the Hindu calendar which
begins at the end of May.
270 Chapter 9

forgotten, but as the child was a minor and there was no proper arrangement
for the princess’s stay, he would soon arrange for everything.
When Sher Shāh began the construction of the dargāh and a fortress there,
Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā appeared in Māhnau’s dream and commanded her to
reach Kolhuaban and to get immersed in remembering Allāh. Māhnau got
ready. Sher Shāh sent her along with her teacher, Saiyyid Ismāʿīl. Māhnau gave
up all luxuries of life and spent her days in worshipping Allāh. She died at
the age of seventy-two. Sher Shāh bestowed twelve revenue-free villages for
the maintenance of Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā’s shrine. A nearby village known as
Chak Bano was actually Chak Māhnau. Māhnau lies buried on the west side of
the shrine of Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā.242 The story of Māhnau is not found in any
other contemporary or near contemporary source.243

(8)
Mukkā Bī
Period: Early Sixteenth Century
Place: Bidar, Karnataka, India

The only source of information about Mukkā Bī is a small footnote in Yazdani’s

account of the shrine enclosure of Ḥaẓrat Multānī Bādshāh, or Bashā, whose
original name was Abu’l Fatḥ Shamsu’d-Dīn Muḥammad al-Qādirī (862/1458–
935/1529).244 Among several other graves of Multānī Bashā’s disciples, one is
that of Mukkā Bī. Yazdani, while copying the inscription found on Mukkā Bī’s
tombstone, is more concerned with the style and quality of the language; for
us, however, this inscription is significantly helpful in taking the first step in
reconstructing the lost histories of women.245
Given below is the translation rendered from Yazdani’s text of the inscrip-
tion in Farsi and the Deccani Urdu (some text is missing in the inscription).

242 Saiyyid Shafiq Aḥmad. (n. d.). Tazkira Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā. Mau: Āsitāna ʿāliya Dargah
Sharīf.
243 Qāẓī Athar Mubarakpurī refers to this story as a local legend, see “Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Aḥmad
Bādpā.” Maʿarif, January 1990, p. 21.
244 Multānī Bādshāh’s father, Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Ibrāhīm migrated from Multan to Bidar during
the reign of ʿAlāu’d-Dīn Aḥmad Bahmanī (1436–58), hence his alias Multānī Bādshāh.
Wāqiʿāt-i Mamlukat-i Bījāpūr (ḥiṣṣā som), p. 115.
245 Yazdani writes, “The style of writing as well as the language of the inscription is crude,
and as it is dated 1258 H., it shows that public taste in literary matters at that time was at
a very low level.” Bidar, its History and Monuments, p. 108.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 271

Translation
… the Chosen, Muḥammad … bless …
There is no god but God and Muḥammad is the Prophet of God.
Mukkā Bī, the pious slave of Quṭb Muḥammad Multānī Qadirī.
Enclosed (right). Muhiʾu’d-Dīn Jīlānī Qāidirī. 1258 H. Mukkā Bī.
Enclosed (left). Ḥusain. 812.
And one well built by ʿᾹlamgīr (or during ʿᾹlamgīr’s reign) and ten
wells of Shaikh Bāwī, purchased by me (are an endowment for the
distribution of) bread and sweets, for the fee of the Qur’ān recit-
ers, and for the expenses of oil (for the lamps of the dargāh). I also
dedicate the villages, lands, mango trees, etc., attached to the tomb
of Mukkā Bī. Whoever shows avarice in respect of this endowment,
may he be deprived tomorrow (the Day of Judgment) of the Divine
vision and the intercession of the Prophet!
In the name of God, the most Merciful and Compassionate.
Verse
The thirsty may drink the water and the hungry enjoy the bread, but
if thou committest a theft it is tantamount to thy cutting the nose or
the tresses of Mukkā Bī.246

The last line of the above inscription could also be translated, as whoever com-
mits theft, Mukkā Bī will cut his nose or her tresses.
From the above few lines of the inscription, we can glean the following
information about Mukkā Bī. Of course, one has to be careful in drawing con-
clusions. The first line of the inscription says Mukkā Bī zāhid kanīzak Quṭb
Muḥammad Multānī, which literally would mean, as Yazdani has also trans-
lated, “a pious slave of Quṭb Muḥammad Multānī.” Though the word kanīzak
means a maidservant or a slave girl, it is also often used for a female disci-
ple. The word zāhid (pious) defines her status as a person who abstains from
worldly luxuries. We do not know anything about her family. Did she come
with Quṭb Muḥammad Multānī Qadirī or was she related to him? Indeed,
more research and investigation on the theme of women travelling, either as
Sufis or in the caravan of Sufis, from North India to the Deccan states would be
a fascinating subject.

246 Ibid, p. 108; also, see Bendrey, Vasudeo Sitaram. 1944. A Study of Muslim inscriptions; with
special reference to the inscriptions published in the Epigraphia Indo-Moslemica, 1907–1938.
Together with summaries of inscriptions chronologically arranged. Bombay: Karnatak
Publishing House, p. 177.
272 Chapter 9

(9)
Bībī Rānī
Period: Sixteenth Century
Place: Thatta, Pakistan

Paying tribute to Bībī Rānī, Muḥammad ʿĀzam Thattawī, in Tuḥfatu’l-ṭāhirīn

(the gift of the holy ones), a compendium of biographical notices of Sufis of
Makli Hills and Thatta compiled in 1190/1776, describes her as the woman friend
of Allāh of her time (walīya -yiʿaṣr), the most accomplished of the age (kāmila
yi dahr), and one of those who were the masters of gnosis (aṣḥāb-iʿirfān). Bībī
Rānī was a resident of Thatta, a city in present-day Sindh. However, while she
was still alive, for a long period of time, no one either knew about her real
status (ḥaqīqat-i ḥāl) or had any information (iṭṭilāʿ nā dāsht) about her spiri-
tual attainments as she seldom associated with anyone. Like a true Sufi, she
avoided publicity and remained concealed. ʿĀzam Thattawī narrates how this
secret was unveiled by a chance incident. A story about her goes like this: Once
a man suffering from a strange and painful disease presented himself at the
august assembly of Ḥaẓrat Bahāʾu’d-Dīn Gudriyā Faqīr, to seek his blessings
for a cure.247 Ḥaẓrat Gudriyā Faqīr, who always remained engrossed in ecstasy
(wajd wa ḥāl istighrāq būd), upon hearing his story, bowed his head down in
deep meditation. He then told the man, “You have hurt some righteous person
(ṣāḥib-i dil) and it is beyond my prowess to heal what afflicts you. However,
I can give you information (surāgh) to seek help from a respectable woman
in your neighbourhood, a virtuous person of great piety, ṣāḥib-i dil wa pārsā,
who is also khudāwand-i māʿrifat wa taqwā (master of gnosis and piety) and is
a walīya kāmila (perfect mystic) of her time. Go to her and seek her help. Her
prayers might solve your problems. Her name is Bībī Rānī.” Hearing this, the
man urgently presented himself in front of Bībī Rānī. Listening to his tale of
misery and affliction, Bībī Rānī first comforted him by telling him not to worry
and that soon he would be well. Then she said, “I used to pass my days in pri-
vacy and solitude and nobody knew about my real status. Now, unveiled and
known all over (aknūn shuhrāh āfāq shudam), living is bereft of all charm (man
dar duniyā ḥalāwat nā khwāhad dād). Therefore, it is better to depart from this

247 Ḥaẓrat Bahāʾu’d-Dīn Gudriyā Faqīr was a disciple of Makhdūm Luṭfullah known as
Makhdūm Nuḥ (1500–1590) of the Suhrawardī Sufi silsila and is buried in Hala, Sindh.
See Shaikh Muḥammad ʿĀzam Thattawī. 1956. Tuḥfatu᾽l-ṭāhirīn. Karachi: Sinhdī Adabī
Board, p. 61.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 273

world.” Three days following this dialogue, the man was fully cured. That night,
the righteous woman (nek zan) Bībī Rānī, the Maryam-i zamāṅ (the Maryam of
her time), passed away. She lies buried in Thatta.248

(10)
Ḥaẓrat Bībī Shamsa Mā Ṣāḥiba
Period: Sixteenth Century
Shrine: Fakhrabad, Bijapur, India
ʿUrs: 16 Rajabu’l-murajjab

Bībī Shamsa Mā Ṣāḥiba belonged to the family of Khwāja Saiyyid Muḥammad

Ḥusainī Gisū Darāz. Muḥammad Ibrāhīm Zubairī, in his tazkira, Rawẓatu’l
awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, written in 1825–1826, stated that because of her piety, virtues,
and miraculous powers, he extolled her as the crown of men of her age (apne
zamāne ke rijāl kī tāj). Her domed shrine stands outside the gate of Zuhrapur,
near Fakhrabad.249 There are four graves of males, one of which is of Ḥaẓrat
Shāh Abu’l Ḥasan Fakhrābādi (d. 1010/1601) who was related to her.250
Shāh Saifullah Qādirī Shaṭṭārī Sibghat Allāh, the translator of Rawẓatu’l
awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, added a note to the translation. He reports that in 1315/1896,
the year of the publication of the Urdu translation, as Bībī Shamsa Mā Ṣāḥiba
had left no family members, the people of the neighbourhood celebrated the
ʿurs. No further details could be found about her either by Zubairī or later by
Saifullah Qādirī.251 Because of the similarity of the style of construction of the
tombs of Ḥaẓrat Shāh Abu’l Ḥasan Fakhrābādi and of Bībī Shamsa, and the
proximity of the graves to each other, it is assumed that both were contempo-
rary Sufis.

248 Tuḥfatu᾽l-ṭāhirīn, pp. 140–41; also, see Muḥammad Iqbāl Ḥusain Naʿīmī. 1987. Tazkira-yi
awliyā-yi Sindh. Karachi: Shāriq Publications, p. 42; Iʿjāzu’l-ḥaqq Quddūsī, 1959. Tazkira
Ṣūfīyya‌ʾ-yi Sindh. Karachi: Urdu Academy, pp. 432–33.
249 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, p. 223. Zuhrapura is a suburb of Bijapur and is named after
Zuhrā Sultan (d. 1625), one of the daughters of Sultan Ibrahim ʿᾹdil Shāh of Bijapur
(d. 1627).
250 A member of the family of Khwāja Gisū Darāz, Ḥaẓrat Shāh Abu’l Ḥasan Fakhrābādi
was highly revered by Sultan Ibrāhīm ʿᾹdil Shāh. Ḥaẓrat Shāh Abu’l Ḥasan built a well-
flourished quarter in the suburbs of Bijapur and named it as Fakhrābād. See Rawẓatu’l
awliyā-yi Bijāpur, pp. 48–9; also, Maḥbūb zil-manan-Tazkira Awliyāʾ-yi dakan. p. 42.
251 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, p. 223.
274 Chapter 9

(11)
Sulṭāna Bībī
Period: Sixteenth Century
Shrine: Nagapattinam, Tamilnadu, India

In the dargāh of Ḥaẓrat Mīrā Ṣaḥib at Nagapattinam, the graves of sixteenth-

century saint Shāhul Ḥamīd Nagori (d. 1579), also called Nagore Andawar,252
and of his pious wife, Ḥaẓrat Sulṭāna Bībī, lie next to each other.253 The dargāh
(also known as Palli masjid) of Shāhul Ḥāmid Nagori, most venerated for
his miraculous powers, celebrates a splendid fourteen-day-long ʿurs called
Kanturī or jhande (flag) in local language. On this occasion, huge crowds of
devotees from all religions, including Hindu and Muslim pilgrims from Sri
Lanka, Penang (Malaysia), and Indonesia, assemble at the premises.254 On the
ʿurs days women in large numbers sit around the tomb and chant devotional
poems, called Nakiyan antatim in the Tamil language. Offerings are made with
coconuts, garlands of marigold flowers, sandal paste, and sweetmeats. Women
come to offer their supplications and pay their tributes to the honorific life and
the blessed memory of the saints.255

(12)
Bībī Ṣūrat
Period: Sixteenth Century
Place: Samana, Punjab

252 Andawar, a Tamil word for lord or master; for more details, see S.A.A. Saheb. 1998. ‘A
‘Festival of Flags’ Hindu-Muslim devotion and the sacralising of localism at the shrine of
Nagore-e-Sharif in Tamil Nadu,’ in Pnina Werbner and Helene Basu (Edited) Embodying
Charisma Modernity, Locality, and Performance of Emotion in Sufi Cults (pp. 55–76).
London: Routledge.
253 The dargah complex because of its size and amenities that it provides is ‘like a self-
contained township’. See Sunil S. Amrith, 2013. Crossing the Bay of Bengal: the furies of
nature and the fortunes of migrants. http://site.ebrary.com/id/10767726; also S.S. Amrith.
2009. “Tamil diasporas across the Bay of Bengal.” The American Historical Review, 114 (3):
pp. 547–72.
254 Malika Mohammada. 2007. The foundations of the Composite Culture in India. Delhi:
Aakar Books, pp. 223–27; For replicas of this dargah in Singapore and Penang and the ven-
eration for Shahul Ḥamīd Naguri in these regions, see Torsten Tschacher, The Impact of
being Tamil on Religious life among Tamil Muslims in Singapore. A Thesis Submitted to the
University of Cologne, 2006; Susan Baylay. 1988. “Islam and State Power in Pre-colonial
India,” in P.J. Marshall et al. (Edited), Indonesia during the Ancien Regime. (pp. 143–164)
Leiden: Brill.
255 Sita Anantha Raman. 2009. Women in India: A Social and Cultural History, vol. 1., Santa
Barbara, Calif: Praeger, p. 32.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 275

Bībī Ṣūrat was the daughter of Miyāṅ Bustān Kakar,256 the grandfather of
Haibat Khan who helped Khwāja Niʿmatu’llah Harāwī in collecting material for
the writing of his book Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī.257 Haibat
Khan, in terms of family relationship, was the grandson of Bībī Ṣūrat’s only
brother, Shādī Khan. This family connection is the major source of the notice
on Bībī Ṣūrat.
Khwāja Niʿmatu’llah Harāwī, in his narrative of Bībī Ṣūrat, describes her as
ṣāliḥ daurān (the chaste of her age) and sājida-yi zamān (the worshipper of her
time). Throughout her life, she did not spend even one single moment without
recitation (tilāwat) of the Qurʾān or recollection and invocation (zikr) of Allāh.
Bībī Ṣūrat was blessed both by physical charm and sharp intellect (bā kamāl
ṣūri wa mʿanwi ārāsta būdand).258 When Bībī Ṣūrat grew up and reached the
age of discretion and learning (sinn-i rushd wa tamīz), she acquired such pro-
found knowledge of Islamic jurisprudence ( fiqh) and scholarship in matters
related to Islamic law (sharīʿā) that was incomparable with anyone. Women in
large numbers used to visit her daily to seek information about various legal
issues. As she had good looks, too, relatives and kinsfolk began to approach
with marriage proposals. Her mother, seeing Bībī Ṣūrat all the time reciting
the Qurʾān and lost in spiritual meditation, did not say yes to these proposals.
However, the demand and the pressure of the relatives kept mounting. One
day, one of them asked the mother the reasons for women visiting her house
each day in large numbers. The mother had to tell the truth. From that day
onward, the mother began refusing the proposals.
Following the demise of her father, Miyāṅ Bustān Kakar, Bībī Ṣūrat inher-
ited a large share of his possessions. She distributed all her inherited wealth
among the poor and did not keep anything for herself. The author of Tārīkh-i

256 Malik Bustān Kakar’s family connection with the Lodi Sultanate began in the era of Sultan
Bahlul Lodi (1451–89) who in recognition of the political-military services of Malik Firūz
Kakar gave him the fief of Sirhind. The Kakars, though amassed great wealth due to con-
tinuous state patronage, however, they remained equally involved in promoting learning.
Malik Bustān Kakar, Bībī Ṣūrat’s father was given the fief of Samana by Sultan Sikandar
Lodi (r.1489–1517). However, following the death of the next ruler, Sultan Ibrahim Lodi
(r.1517–26) which marked the end of the Lodi rule, Bustān Kakar retired to Samana, giving
up worldly by giving away his wealth and position. He spent his days remembering Allāh,
helping others by giving away his wealth. For further details, see Niʿmatu’llah Harāwī.
1962. Tarikh-i-Khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i-Afghānī: (a complete history of the Afghānīs in
Indo-Pak sub-continent), Vol. 2. Dacca: Asiatic Society of Pakistan, pp. 886–87.
257 Niʿmatu’llah Harāwī has mentioned this at several places in his work, however, in the
notice on Bībī Ṣūrat, he makes a particular reference to his role while describing the
ancestry of Bībī Ṣūrat, p. 828.
258 Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī, vol., 2, p. 887.
276 Chapter 9

khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī rightly comments that thus, in devotion and

prayers, Bībī Ṣūrat was so far ahead of men (dar ʿibādat wa riyāẓat az maidān-i
mardāṅ rubūda būd) that not only women but also men sought her blessings so
that their prayers and supplications were heard by Allāh. These men remained
associated with her (maqrūn mishud).259
The story of Bībī Ṣūrat redefines a Pashtūn woman. Contrary to the popular
representation of a Pashtūn woman as voiceless, deprived of inheritance, and
devoid of agency, Bībī Ṣūrat possessed profound knowledge in jurisprudence,
helped other women by sharing this knowledge and solving their legal issues,
made her own decision not to marry, and inherited a large ancestral fortune
which she chose to give away to the poor and needy. Her male relatives, includ-
ing her father and brother, did not hinder her work. More importantly, scribes
of Pashtūn ethnicity have praised and commemorated her achievements by
documenting her life. Khwāja Niʿmatu’llah Harāwī’s concluding words say that
after Rābʿiā al-ʿAdawiyya, in virtues of munificence and generosity (sakhāwat)
and in helping humankind (dast-gīrī-i khalāʾiq), no other woman like Bībī
Ṣūrat has existed in this world. These are not words of conventional apprecia-
tion; they are words spoken in truth.

9.7 Sufi Women of the Seventeenth Century

(1)
Bībī Bandagī Ḥusainī
Period: Not known
Place: Bidar
Shrine: Bidar, Karnataka, India

Ḥaẓrat Bībī Bandagī Ḥusainī has come to be known through her shrine and her
devotees. The presence of her impressive-looking tomb enclosure near other
Sufi shrines in Bidar, and the visitation of her grave by devotees, convince one
of the historicity of her spiritual station. As evident from her name, the Bībī
was a close family member of the Chishtī Sufi, Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Bandā Nawāz
Gīsū Darāz (d. 1422).260
The only reference about Bībī Bandagī Ḥusainī comes from Ghulām
Yazdani’s Bidar, Its History and Monuments, a report published in 1947. At the
time of his survey of these monuments, he located several other monuments

259 Ibid, pp. 828–30.

260 Bidar, its History and Monuments, p. 170.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 277

in the vicinity of Bībī Bandagī Ḥusainī’s tomb, including a mosque, part of

which had already fallen down and what was left was covered with “prickly
shrubs and rank vegetation.” Near this mosque, and close to the tomb of Ḥaẓrat
Walī Ullāh Ḥusainī,261—a Sufi regarded with great veneration and who is a
descendant of Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Bandā Nawāz Gīsū Darāz—Yazdani discovered
the shrine of Bībī Bandagī Ḥusainī. Surrounded by an eighteen-foot-high para-
pet wall, the sepulchral chamber is entered through a single low doorway. The
Bībī reposes in the centre, with two graves of unnamed women on her right
and one grave of a male on her left, all of whom were most probably her close
family members.262
I could not ascertain the time that Bībī Bandagī Ḥusainī lived. Ḥaẓrat Walī
Ullāh Ḥusainī is known to be present around 1656, the year when the major
areas of Bidar and the surrounding territory fell into the hands of Aurangzeb.
Until more research is done by archaeologists to uncover the hidden history of
monuments or by historians to document the history of the large number of
descendants of Khwāja Gīsū Darāz, Bībī Bandagī Ḥusainī’s story will remain
hidden and obscure.

(2)
Bībī Durrā Quṣūrī
Period: Seventeenth Century
Place: Quṣūr, Punjab, Pakistan

Bībī Durrā belonged to the Ḥusainza‌ʾī clan of the Shammuzʾīān Pashtūn tribe.
Her husband, Saʿīd Khan, was a Mūsāza‌ʾī Pashtūn. ʿAbdullah Kheshgī, in his
seventeenth-century work Akbāru’l awliyāʾ min lisānu’l aṣfiyāʾ, pays tribute
to her saintly virtues and accounts for her several miracles (khwāriq bisyār).
He eulogises her as ʿārifa-yi waqt (gnostic of her age) and as kāmil-i zamān
(a perfect mystic of her time).263 Narrating her miraculous powers to fore-
see the future, Kheshgī writes that one day while her sons were away from
Quṣūr with their employer, Bībī Durrā was lost in deep meditation. After a
while, she lifted her head up (sar az marāqba bar āwarda) and said, “What
did happen that I see my sons without their heads?” A few days later, news of
her sons being beheaded by their own employer was brought to her. At this
time, though ʿᾹlam Khan, Bībī Durrā’s paternal grandson, was not yet born, she
stated that she was seeing ʿᾹlam Khan’s garden (bāgh), which meant she was

261 Ibid, p. 110.

262 Ibid, pp. 169–70.
263 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fols. 653a & b.
278 Chapter 9

foreseeing his sons and grandsons. This prediction came true. A grandson was
born named ʿᾹlam Khan, and he later had one daughter and four sons. This
daughter of ʿᾹlam Khan was later married to ʿAbdullah Kheshgī, the author
of Akbāru’l awliyāʾ and Maʿāriju’l wilāyat.264 Mujaddidī calculates 1070/1660 as
the year of this marriage.265

(3)
Khwashtarā Bībī
Period: Seventeenth Century
Place: Ahmadabad, Gujarat, India

The story of Khwashtarā Bībī266 comes from Mirāt-i Aḥmadī, a mid-eighteenth-

century account of the history of Gujarat by ʿAlī Muḥammad Khan.267 A devoted
gnostic of her time and of all times (ʿābida zamān wa ʿārifa āwān), Khwashtarā
Bībī belonged to the family of Sufis and ascetics. Tracing her ancestry to the
celebrated Sufi, Shaikh ʿAzīzullah Mutāwakkil (912/1506), Mirāt-i-Aḥmadị says
that she was his great-granddaughter through his son Shaikh Saʿadu’llah’s son
Shaikh Makhdūm Rafi῾u᾽llah. She was the maternal aunt (khālā) of another
Sufi, Shaikh Muḥammad Chishtī (d. 1040), who in his external and hidden
knowledge was incomparable in his times (dar ʿilm-i-zāhir wa bāṭị n yagānā-yi
ruzgār būdand).268 Though she lived long (ʿumr darāzyāftāh), details of her life
are missing.
Similar to the ascetic traditions of her great-grandfather, Shaikh ʿAzīzullah
Mutāwakkil—who chose to live in poverty, had extreme trust in Allāh
(baghāyat faqr o tawakkul dāsht), and did not allow people of wealth to be
present in his sessions (aghniyā rā majlis-i-khud rāh nadād)269—she also had
no inclination for worldly possessions. Illustrating this quality of Khwashtarā
Bībī, Mirāt-i Aḥmadī narrates an incident. When the Mughal Emperor Jahangir
arrived in 1618 on a tour of Gujarat, along with others, he also called the Bībī
to meet her.270 The meeting, however, did not happen as the Bībī declined the

264 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fol. 124b.

265 Muḥammad Iqbal Mujaddidī. 1972. Aḥwāl wa Āsār ʿAbdullah Kheshgī Quṣūrī (Lahore:
Dāru’l Muʾarrikhīn), p. 28.
266 Her name is the feminine derived from the word khwashtar, which in Persian means
sweeter or pleasanter.
267 ʿAli Muḥammad Khan. 1306/1889. Mirāt-i Aḥmadi- jild sānī. Bombay: Maṭbaʿ Fathu’l
Karīm, p. 54.
268 Ibid, pp. 48–51. During Emperor Jahangir’s tour of Gujarat, the Shaikh had a meeting with
him. He spent his life in seclusion in a mosque on the banks of river Sabarmati in Gujarat.
269 For his short biographical notice, see AA, p. 267.
270 Though there is no direct evidence to show that Emperor Jahangir had desired to meet
Khwashtarā Bībī, there are references in the Tuzuk-i Jahangiri showing that during his
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 279

invitation saying that as she lived in seclusion (mā mastūrāt goshānishīn) what
had she to do by meeting with the kings (mārā bā mulāqāt bādshahān chih
kār).271 To avoid any appearance of arrogance, however, she added that if the
emperor wished for prayers and benedictions (agar duʿā mī khwāhand), she
could do that in absentia (ghāʾībānā duʿa kunam).272 At this, the Emperor was
disappointed but had no other option (maʿzūr dāsht wa mutaʿqid shud).
Her noble grave (qabr sharīf) is in Nasirabad, close to that of Makhdūm
ʿAṭāʾullah, father of Shaikh Naṣru’llah Chishtī.273

(4)
Bībī Māhlat
Period: Seventeenth Century
Place: Allahabad, India

Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf, a resident of Lucknow, is the only author who, in his biog-
raphy of South Asian Sufis and mystics, Bahr-e Zakhkhār, written in 1788–1789,
included a notice on the life of Bībī Māhlat.274 The notice begins with the
most eulogistic description: aḥwāl āṅ mustaghriq jamāl-i mʿābud, āṅ maḥw-i
mushāhidā-i wadūd, āṅ Bilqīs Ṣaba-yi khudārasī (Account of one engrossed by
the beauty of the Divine, overpowered by the vision of Allāh -the Bilqīs of Saba,
obtaining Divine proximity).
Comparing and equalising Bībī Māhlat with Bilqīs of Saba, Wajihu’d-Dīn
Ashraf has raised Bībī Māhlat to unsurpassed sublime heights of Bilqīs.275
Though much information about Bībī Māhlat remains lost, according to his

tour of Gujarat, Jahangir visited several Sufi shrines and met with Shaikhs. Explaining the
reasons for such meetings, Jahangir writes that he directed the leading Shaikhs “to pro-
duce whatever persons they believed to be in want. Similarly, I appointed some women to
do the same thing in the harem. My soul endeavour was that as I a king had come to this
country after many years, no single person should be excluded.” See Henry Beveridge and
Alexander Rogers. 1909. The Tûzuk-i-Jahāngīrī, or Memoirs of Jahāngīr. London: The Royal
Asiatic Society, p. 440. Perhaps the author of Mirāt-i-Aḥmadi was aware of an invitation
sent to Khwashtarā Bībī. In addition, Mirāt-i-Aḥmadi narrates Jahangir’s meeting with
Khwashtarā Bībī’s nephew, Shaikh Muḥammad Chishtī in Gujarat to whom Jahangir had
earlier made several cash and land grants, which the Shaikh declined, except one piece of
land as a maintenance grant. See Mirāt-i Aḥmadi, jild sānī, pp. 449–51.
271 Mirāt-i Aḥmadi, jild sānī, p. 54.
272 Ibid, p. 55.
273 Ibid.
274 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar (vol. 3), pp. 370–71.
275 Surah An-Naml (27) of the Qurʾān is believed to have the story of Bilqīs of Sheba. For fur-
ther details of this story, see Chapter 6: ‘The Chapter of Bilqīs, Queen of Sheba’ (no page
nos.) in Barbara Freyer Stowaser’s Women in the Qurʾān, Traditions, and Interpretation. NY:
OUP (1994).
280 Chapter 9

brief narrative, she was married early but her husband passed away. She grew
up in an environment permeated with some of the best traditions of South
Asian taṣawwuf having strong bonds with the excellent legacy of the South
Asian Chishtiyya devotion which led to the emergence of dynamism in Muslim
thinking. Qāẓī Ṣadru’d-Dīn, commonly known as Qāẓī Ghāsī, was the Qāẓī of
Allahabad and was the first disciple and khalīfa of Shaikh Muḥibu’llah Illāhābādī
(also spelt Allāhābādī) (1587–1648) of the silsila-yi Chishtiyya-Sābiriyya of the
Sufis.276 Qāẓī Ghāsī, a virtuous person of excellent qualities (bisyār buzurg),
was a man of learning with exalted traits (khujasta shamāʾil wa afẓal fuẓāʾil).277
Qāẓī Ghāsī and his mentor, Muḥibu’llah Illāhābādī,278 through their teach-
ings and writings, from the days of Dārā Shikūh279 to the present day have
left a formidable influence of rationalistic thoughts on the socioreligious and
intellectual trends of South Asian Muslims.280 Muḥibu’llah Allāhābādī, in the
words of Chittick, “was the most learned representative of the school of Ibn
al-ʿArabī in the subcontinent.”281 It is significant note that Mullā Quṭbu’d-Dīn
Sihālwī Shahīd (murdered in 1691) the ancestor of the ʿulamāʾ of Farangi
Maḥall, Lucknow, took bʿait at the hands of Qāẓī Ghāsī and became his spiritual
successor.282

276 Qāẓī Ghāsī’s father, Qāẓī Ṣadru’d-Dīn, was also a high-ranking judicial officer of Allahabad
and possessed wealth, see Nuzhat al-khawāṭir, vol. 5, p. 542.
277 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, (vol. 1), p. 648.
278 For a notice on Shaikh Muḥibu’llah Allāhābādī, see ʿAbd al-Raḥmān Chishtī. 1982.
Mirātu’l asrār. pp. 1193–95; Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, Vol. 1, pp. 645–648; Muḥammad Ḥusain.
1876. Anwāru’l ʿᾹrifīn. Lucknow, Nawal Kishore, pp. 502–507; Nuzhat al-khawāṭir, vol. 5,
pp. 609–11 gives a list of his literary works.
279 For Shaikh Muḥibu’llah Allāhābādī’s relations with Dārā Shikūh, see Hafiz Muhammad
Tahir Ali. 1973. “Shaikh Muḥibu’llah of Allahabad—Life and Times,” Islamic Culture,
47: 241–56; Mirdula Jha. 2017. ‘Mingling of the Oceans: A Journey through the Works of
Dara Shikuh,’ (93–106) in Raziuddin Aquil and David L. Curley ed. Literary and Religious
Practices in Medieval and Early Modern India (Edited). Routledge.
280 Zamiruddin Siddiqui, M. 1981. “Shah Muhibb Alahh Ilahabadi and The Liberal Tradition
in Islam”. Proceedings of the Indian History Congress. 42: 289–294; also, see Yusuf Husain
Khan.1964. “Shah Muhibullah of Allahabad and his mystical thought,” in Islamic Culture
38: pp. 315–322.
281 William Chittick, “The School of Ibn ʿArabī”, in History of Islamic Philosophy, ed. Seyyed
Hossein Nasr and Oliver Leaman (New York: Routledge,1996), p. 520.
282 Ghulām ʿAlī Azād Bilgrāmī. 1884. Subḥat al-marjān fī athār Hindustān. Bombay: M.S.
Maḥmūd, p. 76; Ghulām ʿAli Āzād Bilgrāmī. 1328/1910. Daftar-i awwal Maʿāṣiru’l-kirām.
Agra: Matbaʿ Mufīd-i ʿĀ m, pp. 209–210. Azād Bilgrāmī, however gives the date of Mullā
Quṭbu’d-Dīn’s murder as 1013. Also, for Qāẓī Ghāsī’s influence on Mullā Quṭbu’d-Dīn
Sihālwī, see Muḥammad ʿInāyatu’llah Anṣarī. 1930. Tazkira-yi ʿulāmāʾ-yi Farangi Maḥall.
Lucknow: Farangi Mahal, p. 11; Husain, Iqbal. 2002. “Change Within the Islamic Tradition
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 281

Qāẓī Ghāsī, whose dates of birth and death remain unknown, had two chil-
dren, a son named Shaikh Muhiʾu’d-Dīn, who was like a matchless pearl (durr-i
yaktā), and like his father had acquired worldly and spiritual learning; and a
daughter, Bībī Māhlat, a friend of Allāh (waliyya).283 Bībī Māhlat was a highly
pious person who remained absorbed in remembering Allāh (bisyār buzurg
wa sāḥib-i istighrāq). She was well known for her Sufi perfections (dar kamālat
mashhūr āfāq būd). Early in her life, she was married to a valiant person who
went away to fight (bā mujāhidat dar āmad). Bībī Māhlat, now left alone, gave
away all the wealth she possessed to the impoverished and the indigent (bā
muḥtājān bakhshīd).284 She also spent all the proceeds of her ancestral grants
on the needy and the poor ones (ḥāsilāt-i tamghā bar ḥāsil jadd-i khud rā sarf
miskinān wa muḥtājān). She met her own expenses with her earnings from
spinning yarn (az farokht resmān). She was indeed one of those pious persons
who contemplated Allāh’s Glory (sāḥib-i mushāhidā bud).285 She lies buried
in a graveyard known as Bāgh Bībī Māhlat, near Hassan Manzil, Allahabad.
Her father’s shrine is close by. Large numbers of devotees continue to visit her
shrine and seek her blessings.286

(5)
Bībī Mammi
Period: Seventeenth Century
Place: Quṣūr, Pakistan

According to a notice by ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī, in Akbāru’l awliyāʾ min lisānu’l

aṣfiyāʾ (Tales of friends of God as a tribute to the pure ones), completed in
1077/1666–1667, Bībī Mammi was the sister of Shaikh Yusuf Batukza‌ʾī. She
always remained engaged in worship and other spiritual exercises (ʿibādāt
wa riyāẓāt shughul tamām dāsht). Bībī Mammi was careful to remain in ritual
purification at all times. She was careful that she would take along with her,
wherever she went, a water vessel for performing waẓū (ablution required
for offering prayers).287 Kheshgī also says that all through her life, since she

of Learning: Firangi Mahal and the Dars-i Nizami”. Proceedings of the Indian History
Congress. 63: 439–446.
283 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, Vol. 1, p. 649.
284 Bībī Māhlat must have inherited a large fortune from her paternal grandfather, Qāzi
Da‌ʾūd of Allahabad who also held the post of Qāẓī of Allahabad and was from a wealthy
family having landed property. see Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, Vol. 1, p. 648.
285 Ibid.
286 Documentary Ḥaẓrat Sadaruddin Qāzi Ghāsi Hasan Manzil Allahbad … www.youtube.com.
287 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fols. 124b, 125a.
282 Chapter 9

entered puberty (ibtidā-i bulūgh), Bībī Mammi did not miss a single prayer
except for natural reasons (during menstrual cycles).288
Bībī Mammi’s husband, Mūsā, was impotent (ʿinnīn). Following the blessed
Tradition of the Prophet that whoever would cover the faults of another
Muslim in this world, God will forgive his/her sins in the world hereafter, Bībī
Mammi, to shield her husband from humiliation and embarrassment, and to
cover his condition, would bathe regularly (hameshā ghusl kardi).289 Kheshgī,
in his other biographical work of Chishtiyya Sufis, Maʿāriju’l Wilāyat completed
in 1094/1683, adds that her husband, because of shame and embarrassment,
disappeared and was never found.290
In closing his brief narrative of Bībī Mammi, Kheshgī adds that he had seen
her in his early childhood (dar hangām-i ṭufūliyat). She used to pray for him.
He also recalled that people would often bring water to her to be blessed by
her. Kheshgī cites a case when someone once asked a pious person who was
higher in spiritual status, Bībī Mammi or her brother, Shaikh Yusuf Batukza‌ʾī.
His answer was that he found Bībī Mammi higher in rank than her brother.291

(6)
Ḥaẓrat Bībī Qādirīyyā
Date: Seventeenth Century
Shrine: Bijapur, India

Muḥammad Ibrāḥim Zubairī Qādirī Shaṭṭārī Bijāpuri, in his excellent work

Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, has done a great service by placing life accounts
of Sufi women of the region whose narratives are missing in other texts about
South Asian Sufis. Ḥaẓrat Bībī Qādirīyyā is one of them. Drawing upon Maqṣūd
al-murād, the malfūz of Shāh Hāshim Ḥusainī ʿAlāwī (1576 or 1577–1646), popu-
larly known as Hāshim Gujarati or Hāshim Pīr, Zubairi says that Bībī Qādirīyyā’s
lineage goes back to Saiyyid ʿAbdul Qādir Gilānī of Iraq (d. 561/1166). She was
known for her perfect virtues of being a perfect friend of Allāh (kāmil awliyāʾ)
and had attained great revelations (kāmil mukāshafe).292

288 Maʿāriju’l Wilāyat, MS. No. R344, Iqbal Mujaddidī Collection, Punjab University, Lahore,
fol. 654a.
289 Rules for ritual purification in Islam require washing the body, including the head, after
each sexual intercourse.
290 Maʿāriju’l Wilāyat fols. 653b, 654a.
291 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fol. 125a.
292 For the life account of Hāshim Pīr and his malfūzāt, see Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur,
pp. 94–115; also, Richard Eaton, Sufis of Bijapur, 1300–1700. (New Jersey: Princeton
University Press, 1978), pp. 118–122 and for Ḥaẓrat Bībī Qādirīyyā, p. 225.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 283

The author of Maqṣūd al-murād, as noted in Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur,

recounts that Hāshim Pīr once met a person who did not pay respect to any
woman other than Ḥaẓrat Bībī Qādirīyyā. One can infer from this reference
that Bībī Qādirīyyā was a highly revered person. Perhaps she was known to
Hāshim Ḥusainī ʿAlawi, or she was Hāshim Ḥusainī ʿAlāwi’s contemporary or
lived before him. Her burial place is within the fortification of the Bijapur fort.293

(7)
Haẓrat Quraish Bībī
Period: Seventeenth Century
Shrine: Porto Novo, near Thanjavur, Tamilnadu, India

Except for the charismatic powers of this seventeenth-century Sufi woman,

Haẓrat Quraish Bībī, buried in Porto Novo,294 not much is known. The shrine
is visited for relief from “scorpion bite and all kinds of limb pains.”295 The
miraculous power of Quraish Bībī, Anantha Raman says, represents Shakti, the
female power.296

(8)
Bībī Ṣajīnī
Period: Seventeenth Century
Place: Kachori Gali, Patna, India

Bībī Ṣajīnī, the eldest daughter of Mīr Saiyyid Muḥammad Bāṣīr (d. 1022/1613),
was a pious and virtuous woman who spent her whole life trusting Allāh
(bātawakkul-i-khudā). A perfect gnostic (ʿārifā kāmīl), Bībī Ṣajīnī possessed
knowledge. Early in her life, she decided not to marry and remained engrossed

293 This narrative is drawn from Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, p. 225.

294 Porto Novo (also called Parangipettai), located on the Coromandel coast is a small town
in Cuddalore district in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It used to be the most impor-
tant trading destination of the Arabs, especially the Yemenis. For the history of Muslims
in Kerala, see J.B.P. More. 2011. Origin and Early History of the Muslims of Keralam, 700
AD–1600 AD Calicut: Other Books.
295 Quoted in Susan Bayly. Saints, Goddesses, and Kings: Muslims and Christians in South
Indian Society, 1700–1900. Cambridge [England]: Cambridge University Press (1989) quotes
from an unpublished PhD dissertation (University of Delhi, 1986) by Hasrat Suhrawardī
on ‘The life and works of the Past-Muslim Sufis of Tamilnad with special reference to
Urdu language’, p. 134; Jaweda Habib. 2002. Tārīkh Awliya᾽-i Tamil Nadu. Chenai: Urdu
Publications, p. 95.
296 Sita Anantha Raman. 2009. Women in India. A Social and Cultural History Volume 1. Santa
Barbara, Calif: Praeger/ABC-CLIO, p. 32.
284 Chapter 9

in remembrance (dar yād-i-ilāhī), concentrating on the essence of Allāh (bā

mashghūlī ḥaqq). She chose seclusion and the life of a recluse (dar chilla-i
ʿuzlat khānā nishīnī).297

(9)
Ḥaẓrat Ṣalehā Mā Ṣāḥiba
Date: Seventeenth Century
Shrine: Bijapur, Karnatika, India

Bībī Ṣalehā was the wife of Shāh Hāshim ʿAlawī (d. 1646) of the Shaṭṭārī Sufi
silsila.298 Mā Ṣāḥiba (the reverend mother) was a title given to her as a mark of
respect. It is said that she had the blessings of witnessing Laylat al-qadr (the
Night of Power).299 According to a hagiographical narrative related in Rawẓatu’l
awliyāʾ, one night while she was engrossed in prayers and meditation in her
closet (ḥujra), the signs of Laylat al-qadr began to manifest. Everything, includ-
ing trees and stones, fell into prostration. To prove the incident, she threw her
scarf on the branches of one such tree. Once that tree straightened up from
its position of prostration, her scarf was still hanging atop the branches of the
tree. Next morning people saw her scarf hanging atop the tree. Her grave lies
inside the shrine of Shāh Hāshim ʿAlawī.300

(10)
Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima
Period: Early to Mid-Seventeenth Century
Place: Quṣūr, Punjab, Pakistan

A resident of Quṣūr, Punjab, Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima hailed from the Ḥusainza‌ʾī
clan of the Saiyyidza‌ʾīs of the Pashtūns. ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī’s biography
of the Chishtī Sufis, Akbāru’l awliyāʾ min lisānu’l aṣfiyāʾ (Tales of friends of
God as a tribute to the pure ones), completed in 1077/1666–1667, is the only
source about Sufi women of Quṣūr. Kheshgī had seen her in his boyhood and

297 ῾Abdur Razzāq, ῾Aṭā᾽ Ḥusain. 1302/1884. Kanzu’l Ansāb. Bombay: Maṭbaʿ Ṣafdarī, p. 258.
298 For details of his life, see Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, pp. 94–104; also, Eaton, Richard
Maxwell. 1978. Sufis of Bijapur, 1300–1700: Social Roles of Sufi in Medieval India. Princeton
University Press. pp. 118–22.
299 Laylat al-qadr marks the night when the first verse of the Qurʾān was revealed. For more
details, see Imam Malik ibn Anas. 1989. al-Mutawatta of Imam Malik ibn Anas: The First
Formulation of Islamic Law. London: Routledge, p. 126.
300 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, pp. 223–224.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 285

remembered her well.301 Kheshgī, like most other chroniclers of biographies

of the pious and saintly persons, neglects chronology and gives no dates. His
reference to his boyhood in this narrative, however, helps us in determining
Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima’s historical timeline. Kheshgī was so greatly absorbed in
recording these lives, or perhaps he considered himself insignificant, that he
forgot to mention his own date of birth. With the help of other dates, Iqbal
Mujaddidī, however, comes to an acceptable conclusion that Kheshgī was born
in or around 1043/1633.302 Thus, Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima was born in the early sev-
enteenth century and lived in Quṣūr.
Kheshgī recollects that Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima had little interaction with other
women, spending her days and nights in worshipping, praying, and remember-
ing Allāh. As a worshipper and as an ascetic, she ate little and prayed all through
the night. Like a true abstinent, she kept herself away from sensual pleasures
(lazzat-i nafsāni). Her disinterest in the ordinary life of a married woman went
to such an extent that she requested that her husband get another wife so that
she would be free to worship and pray. She told him that to perform Allāh’s
obedience (tāʿat-i maulā) and service to His creation (khidmat-i makhlūq), i.e.,
living with a husband and fulfilling his needs, at the same time was not pos-
sible for her. The husband could not reject her words and got another wife.
As she was continually engrossed in prayers, Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima spoke little.
Kheshgī recalls how once she got in a trance (ba jazba būd) and then recovered
and was back to her normal state. Sometime after her passing away, a person in
his dream saw Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima in the company of Bībī Fāṭima, the beloved
daughter of the Prophet. When asked how she attained such a high rank, she
said it was because of her excessive remembrance of Allāh (kasrat-i zikr).

(11)
Ḥaẓrat Sittī Mā Ṣaḥiba
Date: D. 1036/1627
Place: Bijapur, Karnatika, India
Shrine: Bijapur, Karnatika, India

The author of Rawẓatu’l-Awliya‌ʾ-yi Bijapur says that Ḥaẓrat Sittī Mā Ṣaḥiba was
walīyya Allāh (a friend of God), ṣāḥib-i kashf wa ʿirfān (master of revelation and
esoteric knowledge), and tāj-i rijāl (glory of men). Legends and hagiographical
narratives associate several miracles (ghaibi wāridāt) with her. She became a

301 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fols. 125b, 126a.

302 Iqbal Mujaddidī.1972. Aḥwāl wa asār ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī Quṣūrī (Lahore: Dāru’l
Muarrikhīn), pp. 26–27.
286 Chapter 9

disciple of Ḥabīb Allāh Ṣibghat Allāhī (d. 1632) by taking his baiʿat and spent
considerable time in his company.303 Ḥabīb Allah Ṣibghat Allāhī was a khalīfa
of Shāh Sibghat Allāh of the Shaṭṭārī Sufi silsila.304 His blessed company raised
her to such a high rank that she could know and share his inner thoughts
(maḥram-i rāz) and his mystical experiences became known to her. It is said
that twice she was blessed with the vision of the Divine Light (tajalli-i Ḥaqq
taʿalā) and once with the rūyat (vision) of the Prophet. While on her deathbed,
she was fed miraculously by heavenly meals (ʿĀlam-i ʿulwī). With her spiritual
powers, she could tell exactly how many days were left for her to die. Ḥaẓrat
Sittī Mā Ṣaḥiba passed away on the seventh of Jamādi-uʾs Sānī of 1036/1627 and
was buried in a shrine next to that of Ḥabīb Allah Ṣibghat Allāhī.
Once, after her passing away, Ḥabīb Allāh Ṣibghat Allāhī dreamt that while
Sitti Mā Ṣaḥiba was sitting with him, a maidservant appeared and informed
her that flowers and sandal brought for her grave were suddenly blown away
by a strong wind. Ṣibghat Allāhī interpreted the dream as Sittī Mā’s disapproval
of the practice of people making offerings of flowers, fragrance, and sandal at
her tomb.305

(12)
Bībī Yasso
Period: Early to Mid-Seventeenth Century
Place: Quṣūr, Punjab, Pakistan

Bībī Yasso, a scion of the Ḥusainza‌ʾi Pashtūn clan, was a saintly woman of
great spiritual merits. A spiritual camaraderie existed between Bībī Yasso and
Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima. In addition to their common tribal Pashtūn ancestry of
belonging to the Ḥusainza‌ʾi clan and their relocation to Quṣūr, which prob-
ably was their birthplace, too, these two devout and godly women had spiri-
tual bonds. ʿAbdullah Kheshgī, who was also from Quṣūr and had the same
common ethnic ties and had spent his boyhood time in the company of Bībī
Shaikhī Fāṭima, might have been an eyewitness.306
Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima, who used to spend much time in the company of Bībī
Yasso, knew about her state of (kashf) and about her spiritual merits. Similar to
a spiritual Master (murshid), Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima would be with Bībī Yasso all

303 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, pp. 63–64, 224–225; Sufis of Bijapur, 1300–1700: Social Roles of
Sufi in Medieval India, pp. 236–37.
304 For a short notice on Shāh Sibghat Allāh, see Azkār-i Abrār, pp. 586–88; Ghulām ῾Alī Āzād
Bilgrāmī. 1910. Daftar-i awwal Maʿāṣiru’l-kirām, pp. 40–42.
305 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, p. 225.
306 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fol.126a.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 287

the time- whether she was in the state of ṣaḥw (sobriety) or in jazb (Divine rap-
ture). During the ecstatic moments of experiencing hangām-i tajalli (theoph-
any), Bībī Yasso was comforted (taskīn) and instructed how to remain under
control and manage it (ẓabṭ) by Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima.307
It is said that once Bībī Yasso visited the wife of one Qāsim, a Bahdanza‌ʾi
Afghān, to do some mediation (shifāʿat). The woman, however, not only did not
accept her request, but treated Bībī Yasso with disrespect (ba itmām khwārī)
and turned her out of her house. Bībī Yasso cursed that Allāh would set the
house on fire and burn all the residents. After a few days, Qāsim and his wife
and children were killed and the house was completely ruined.

9.8 Sufi Women of the Eighteenth Century

(1)
Bībī Ajjī Ṣāḥiba
Period: Early Eighteenth Century
Place: Tajpura, Arcot, Tamil Nadu, India

An incidental reference to Bībī Ajjī in Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur addressing

her as Ḥaẓrat (respected Sir), in a long note on the life of her husband, Ḥaẓrat
Saiyyid ʿAlī Muḥammad Ḥusainī (1076/1665–1138/1725),308 is the only source
about her saintly virtues and speaks volumes about her exalted status. Ḥaẓrat
Saiyyid ʿAlī Muḥammad Ḥusainī was the son and khalīfa of Ḥaẓrat Sulṭān
SayyidʿAbdurʾRaḥman Ḥusainī (d. 1120/1708).309 In addition to his miracle sto-
ries, the more lasting contribution of Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid ʿAlī Muḥammad Ḥusainī
is his Tajalliyāt-i Raḥmānī, a small hagiographic treatise on Sufi doctrines.310
Ḥaẓrat Bībī Ajjī, a daughter of one Nawāb Sarfaraz Khan, had an elite, upper-
class background. Interestingly, the author of Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur uses
the term walīya kāmila (perfect Sufi woman) to describe her merits.311 To

307 For details on aspects of tajalli, the manifestation of the Essence of the Divine, see
Suhrawardī, ʿUmar b. Muḥammad al-, Maḥmūd b. ʿAlī al-Kāshānī, and Henry Wilberforce
Clarke. 1891. The ʿAwārif-al-maʿārif, written in the thirteenth century. Calcutta: Government
of India Central Printing Office, pp. 80–82.
308 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur. pp. 170–172.
309 Ibid, 161–69; this family was related to the family of Saiyyid Muḥammad Mudarris,
father of Shāh Sibghatu’llah (d. 1606). For details, see Richard Maxwell Eaton, Sufis of
Bijapur—1300–1700, pp. 205–10.
310 This Persian manuscript is in the Salār Jang Museum.
311 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, p. 171.
288 Chapter 9

demonstrate and substantiate her spiritual merits and charismatic powers,

he cites an episode. Once fifty visitors arrived unannounced at midday from
Ḥasanpura, where Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid ʿAlī Muḥammad’s paternal cousin Ḥaẓrat
Shāh Sibghatu’llah lived. Two cauldrons were already ready with food for those
who were usually fed by the household. Bībī Ajjī’s husband now asked her to
serve the food to all the guests, including the newly arrived ones. Removing
the lids of the pots, Bībī Ajjī covered them with her blessed scarf (dāman-i
mubarak). She instructed the servants to dish out the food from under her
scarf. When all were fed and the scarf was removed, the cauldrons were still
full to the brim with food.312
She gave birth to two daughters and three sons. No other details are known
about this pious Sufi woman with charismatic powers.

(2)
Bībī ʿĀṣima
Date: D. 17 Zilḥajj 1196/23 November 1782
Place: Damgaŕh, Allahabad, UP, India
Shrine: Damgaŕh, Allahabad, UP, India

Shāh TurābʿAlī Qalandar (1181/1768–1275/1858),313 in Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ (Self-

denial of friends of Allāh), a biography of the Sufis, includes a short notice on
the life of Bībī ʿĀṣima under the heading dar ḥāl Bībī ʿĀṣima zaujā Ḥaẓrat Shāh
Bāsiṭ ʿAlī Qalandar qudisasirra-hu Allahabadī (an account of Bībī ʿĀṣima, wife
of Ḥaẓrat Shāh BāsiṭʿAlī Qalandar, may his tomb be hallowed).314 The couple
had four children: two sons—Ḥaẓrat Masʿūd ʿAlī Qalandar and Shāh Khudā
Bakhsh—and two daughters—Bībī Wajīha and Bībī Ᾱmna.315

312 Ibid, p. 171.

313 Shāh Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar, the eldest son and khalīfa of Ḥaẓrat ʿᾹrif Billah Shāh
Muḥammad Kāzim Qalandar (d. 1806) and whom he describes as a born Sufi, was a
well-read person and a poet of great merit. He was also a Khalīfa of Ḥaẓrat Shāh Masʿūd
῾Alī Qalandar. His dargah in Kākorī where several other pious persons are also buried
is a centre of great reverence. See Ḥāfiz Muḥammad ʿAli Ḥaidar ʿAlawī Kākorwī. 1927.
Tazkira Mahāhīr-i Kākorī. Lucknow: Asḥal maṭāb῾, pp. 75–81; Masʿūd Anwar ῾Alawī
Kākorwī. 1990. Tafṣīātl Mazārāt Sāḥibān-i khānqāh Kāzimiyya. Kākorī Sharīf: Kutubkhānā
Anwariya.
314 Shāh Turāb ῾Alī Qalandar ῾Alawī Kākorwī. 1293/1876. Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ (no name of
the publisher), p. 298.
315 Shāh Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar. Uṣūlu’l maqṣūd. (Lucknow: Asaḥh-u’l maṭabʿ, 1312/1894), p. 176.
For a short notice on Ḥaẓrat Shāh Bāsiṭ ʿAlī Qalandar, see Nuzhat al-khawāṭir vol. 6
(Bayrūt: Dār Ibn Ḥazm), p. 702.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 289

Bībī ʿĀṣima was a disciple of the sixteenth-century Sufi scholar Ḥaẓrat

Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥmān Jāṅbāz Qalandar Lāharpurī of the Qādriyya-Uwaisiyya
Sufi silsila.316 Her husband, Shāh Bāsiṭ ʿAlī Qalandar, was the son of Phūl Bībī
(d. 1758) and Ḥaẓrat Shāh Muḥammad Māh Qalandar. The author of Bībī
ʿĀṣima’s biographical notice, Shāh TurābʿAlī Qalandar, was the most devoted
disciple of Ḥaẓrat Shāh Bāsit ʿAlī Qalandar and thus had personal knowledge
about Bībī ʿĀṣima.
Bībī ʿĀṣima was known as a friend of Allāh of her time (waliyya ʿaṣr). Many
times she was blessed with the presence (ḥuẓūrī) of Ḥaẓrat ʿAlī, the fourth
Caliph, in her dreams. As she was fully informed about the timing of her death
(az wafāt-i khud peshtar muṭṭalaʿ būdand), certain words and signs indica-
tive of the approaching death were expressed by her. Her son, Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid
Masʿūd ʿAlī (d. 1221/1806),317 is quoted to have said that two days before her
demise—that is, on Wednesday, 14 Zilḥajj, 1196—she felt slightly more indis-
posed as compared to other days. She therefore did not talk much and soon
began having convulsions (ghashi ṭāri). By evening, her condition slightly
improved and she appealed to Ḥaẓrat ʿAlī. She raised her hands and suppli-
cated to Ḥaẓrat ʿAlī to allow her two more days to live, as she wished to see her
son Saiyyid Masʿūd ʿAlī commence his work smoothly. As the supplications
of Allāh’s chosen ones (khāsān-i ḥaqq) are never rejected (radd), her prayer
was also answered (mustājāb shud).318 While Saiyyid Masʿūd ʿAlī, Bībī ʿĀṣima’s
son, was sitting near her dead body, his father, Ḥaẓrat Shāh BāsiṭʿAlī Qalandar,
performed ablution, called his son, and, resting his head on his son’s chest,
breathed his last. When the graves of the two were dug, the scent of camphor
(kāfūr) spread all over, attracting countless flies (magas).319

(3)
Daughter of Ḥaẓrat Muḥammad Mīr
Period: Eighteenth Century
Place: Delhi, India

Shāh Ghulām ʿAlī (1745–1824) who succeeded Mirzā Mazhar Jān-i Janān (mar-
tyred in 1781) as his khalīfa of the Naqshbandī Sufi silsila, wrote an account of

316 For a short notice on Jāṅbāz Qalandar Lāharpurī, see Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ, pp. 142–143.
317 A Persian chronogram at his grave in the Damgaŕh shrine says that he died at the age of fifty
years on Monday 25 Jamādiu’l awwal 1221, see Madhav N. Katti (Edited). Archaeological
Survey of India: Annual Report of Epigraphy for 1992–93 (New Delhi: Archaeological Survey
of India, 1996), p. 89.
318 Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ, p. 298. Uṣūlu’l maqṣūd. p. 159.
319 Uṣūlu’l maqsūd, pp. 161–163.
290 Chapter 9

the life of Mirzā Mazhar’s spiritual teachers in Maqāmāt-i Mazhari (Stations

[Sufi] of Mazhar). Of his several teachers, one was Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Muḥammad
ʿĀbid Sanāmi (d. 1747).320 One of Shaikh ʿĀbid Sanāmi’s disciples was
Muḥammad Mīr, distinguished for his life of extreme poverty, austerity, and
seclusion. He was known for his great knowledge, which he generously shared
not only with his disciples but also with anyone who came as a seeker. Shāh
Ghulām ʿAlī writes that he had heard from a pious person that at least twenty
persons attained the status of wilāyat under Muḥammad Mīr’s guidance.321
Muḥammad Mīr’s daughter, who remains unnamed, inherited the mysti-
cal qualities of her father. In a short notice about her which appears in the
larger account of her father, without disclosing her name and referring to her
as dukhtar (daughter), Shāh Ghulām ʿAlī writes that she was one of the female
Sufis of her time (walīyyāt-i ʿaṣr).322 She had the unique honour and privilege
(ikhtisās dāsht) of being blessed in many ways by the Prophet’s closeness and
favours. Several amazing events are associated with her. Whenever anyone
enquired about the various states (aḥwāl) of the Sufi path, she would explain
it well. To those who came to her to seek knowledge (ṭālibān), she used to give
them the Prophet’s blessed hair (mūyi sharīf) as benediction (tabarruk).323
A saintly man of Delhi who had an excellent understanding of ecstasy
(wajdān), of the Light of His Love (nūr-i wilāyat), and of the office of the
Prophet (nabuwwat), told Shāh GhulāmʿAlī that the house of this pious woman
was luminous with the Prophet’s radiance. Because of her intense love for
the Prophet, she was not interested in improving her financial status, which
remained extremely poor. She thus lived in poverty. Matters grew worse for her,
and she could no longer face the intense poverty and considered the option to
migrate to Afghanistan. However, the Prophet directed her not to do so but to
bear poverty and indigence with patience, as patience brings about nearness

320 Shāh Ghulām ʿAlī Dihlawī. 1309/ 1892. Maqāmāt-i-Mazharī. Dihlī: Maṭba᾽ Mujtabāi᾽,
pp. 11–14.
321 Ibid, 13.
322 This pious person was alive and living in Dehli at the time of the writing of Maqāmāt-
i-Mazharī. Pp. 13–14.
323 Tabarruk is something that causes or gives blessings. Obtaining blessings from the physi-
cal essence of the Prophet, which has caused serious debates among the scholars and
theologians of Islam, was a popular practice in South Asia during the late eighteenth and
the nineteenth centuries.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 291

to and union with the Almighty (ṣabr mūjib i qurb wā maʿiyat-i ilāhī ast).324 No
information could be found about her later life.

(4)
Bībī Jīyā
Period: Eighteenth Century
Place: Akbarābād (Agra), India

Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf’s Bahr-e Zakhkhar (the rising ocean), a biographical

compendium of Sufis composed around 1788–1789, is the only source that has
narrated the life of Bībī Jīyā.325 Undoubtedly a great Sufi (walīyyā muṣaffā),
she belonged to the community of oil pressers (qaum-i ʿassār) of Akbarābād
(Agra). She had an intense, never-ending love and an everlasting passion for
the Divine (muwāhabāt-i īzidī, jazbāt-i sarmadī). Not only the rich and the elite
who witnessed her spiritual excellence and perfection and bowed their heads
in supplication before her, but even her contemporary Sufi masters came to
her and had friendly relations (mashāʾikh-i waqt bādū paiwastand). To illus-
trate Sufi Shaikh’s reverence for Bībī Jīyā, Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf cites a conversa-
tion he had with Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Aḥmad Shāh,326 a disciple of Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid
Āl-i Muḥammad.327 Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Aḥmad Shāh narrated that once his Shaikh,
Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Āl-i Muḥammad, whom Āzād Bilgrāmī describes as possess-
ing the Christ-like powers to heal the ailments of heart (izāla-yi amrāẓ-i qalb-i
masiḥāʾī dāsht), sent a message to Bībī Jīyā submitting that his welfare was in
her hands. In response, Bībī Jīyā sent him in writing some Sufi (bʿāẓ asghāl wa
adʿiyā) practices and supplications for him to practice.
Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf did not mention Bībī Jīyā’s dates of birth and death. A
reference to her contacts with Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Āl-i Muḥammad, however, helps
us to surmise that she was alive during the first half of the eighteenth century.

324 Maqāmāt-i Mazharī, pp. 13–14.

325 Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf. Bahr-e-Zakhkhar. (vol. 3), p. 371.
326 I could not find any information about Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Aḥmad.
327 Probably Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf is referring to Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Āl-i Muḥammad (1111/1700–
1164/1751) of Bilgram, settled in Marhara, a dependency of Akbarabad, and a disciple and
khalīfa of his father Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Barkatu’llah, known as Ṣāḥib ul barākāt (1070/1660–
1142/1729) and a Sufi of excellent virtues with a large number of disciples and devotees.
His other son, Saiyyid Nijātu’llah, known as Shāh Miyāṅ (b. 1117/1705) was alive when Ᾱzād
Bilgrami was composing Maʿāsiru’l Kirām. He was also a Sufi of great virtues, see Ghulām
῾Alī Āzād Bilgrāmī.1328/1910. Daftar-i awwal Maʿāsiru’l kirām. Agra: Matba‘ Mufīd-i ʿĀ m,
pp. 121–124.
292 Chapter 9

(5)
Khānam Jī
Date: D. before 1785
Place: Delhi, India

Khānam Jī was a disciple of Shāh Fahkhru’d-Dīn Dihlawī (d. 1199/1785), a

Chishtī Sufi who, after his arrival from Awrangābād, Deccan, in Delhi in 1751,
had established his khānqāh in the city. A brief reference in the malfūzāt of
Shāh Fahkhru’d-Dīn says that Shāh Fahkhru’d-Dīn used to take great care of
Khānam Jī, who had become a widow in her early youth and entered his sil-
sila as a disciple. Ḥaẓrat Fahkhru’d-Dīn used to get new clothes for her, with
gold-coloured trimmings—the sort of thing much liked by women. Her
long skirts (peshwāz) displayed myriad types of quilting (bakhiyā).328 Nawāb
Ghāzīu’d-Dīn Khan, the author of Malfūzāt, comments that Ḥaẓrat Ṣāḥib made
all these arrangements for her so that she could remain engaged in the remem-
brance of Allāh. Shāh Fahkhru’d-Dīn Dihlawī and Nawāb Ghāzīu’d-Dīn Khan
were present when she passed away.329

(6)
Māʾī Sapūraṅ/Ṣafūrā Qādirīyyā
Date: B. 1747, D. 1209/1795
Shrine: Basti Māʾi Safūra or Mauza῾ Mā᾽i Safoora,
Toba Tek Singh, Punjab, Paksitan

Māʾī Sapūraṅ, or Ṣafūrā, lies buried in a beautifully built, well-illuminated

shrine managed by her descendants in Basti Māʾī Ṣafoora in Punjab. Textual
accounts in primary Sufi sources for this venerated person are missing. A brief
note, based on legends, by Arnold (1864–1939), an orientalist who taught at the
MAO College (Aligarh), seems to form the source for all the later notices about
Māʾī Sapūraṅ. He writes that in the District of Multan there “is the tomb of a
woman named Māʾī Sapūraṅ, who has given her name to the village where she
lies buried.” She was “a disciple of a saint named ʿAbdul Ḥakīm, who died in
1732. She was able to spread her prayer-carpet on the waters of the River Ravi

328 Quilting is one of the preferred practices of Sufis. Needle and not the scissor is preferred
by the Sufis. Khwāja Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar is reported to have told a man to bring
him a needle and not a knife. The knife cuts, whereas the needle joins. See, FF, Assembly 5,
28th Shawwāl 719/1319.
329 Shāh Fahkhru’d-Dīn Dihlawī. Malfūzāt wa ḥālāt Shāh Fahkhru’d-Dīn Dihlawī (Urdu
translation of Fakhru’l Ṭālibīn wa Manāqib-i Fakhariyā by Mīr Nazar ʿAlī Dard Kakorwī)
Karachi; Salman Academy, 1961, pp. 118–19.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 293

and kneel for prayer upon it, and could cure the bites of mad dogs.”330 The
Multan District Gazetteer says that Māʾī Sapūraṅ belonged to the Nunari caste.331
Imtiyaz Ḥusain Shāh, in his Tazkira Awliyāʾ-i Multan, a book of short bio­
graphies of Sufis of Multan in Urdu, gives some more information in addi-
tion to what Arnold has mentioned.332 His dates, however, do not agree with
those given by Arnold. Although her shrine gives 1209/1794 as the date of her
death,333 Imtiyaz Ḥusain Shāh writes that Māʾī Sapūraṅ, whose original name
was Ṣafūrāṅ, was born in 1155/1742 and died in 1909334 in the small town of
Jarŕālā in the Nonari community, a community of salt makers.335
Oral traditions, confirmed by her descendants on FaceBook,336 trace her lin-
eage to Caliph ʿUmar Farūq, saying that she was of Arab descent. Her descen-
dants claim that her father’s name was Rustam ʿAlī and her grandfather was
one Khwāja Abu’l-Fatḥ Dāw᾽ūd Qādirī, an Arab merchant. The same sources
confirm that Ṣaleḥ Muḥammad Safūri, author of the poetical collection
Kulliyāt-i Ṣāleh, was her son.
Since early childhood, she was devoted to prayers and remembrance of
Allāh and thus came to be known as one who possesses spiritual knowledge.
Later on, she took baiʿat at the hands of ʿAbdul Ḥakīm and performed forty
chillās. Later, she stayed at his khānqāh, which is quite unusual as women are
not known to have stayed within the khānqāhs. Soon people began addressing
her as Āsan puran (one who fulfils wishes) which later turned into Sapūraṅ. At
an early age, she was betrothed to one Nūr Muḥammad who was from her own
community. She had one son, Maulawī Muḥammad Ṣāleḥ, who constructed
her shrine.

330 T.W. Arnold. 1908. ‘Saints and Martyrs (Muhammadan in India),’ In James Hastings,
John A. Selbie, and Louis H. Gray (Edited). Encyclopædia of religion and ethics. New York:
Charles Scribner’s Sons, pp. 68–73; for other sources, see E.D. Maclagan. 1902. Gazetteer of
the Multan district, 1901–02. Lahore: “Civil and Military Gazette” Press, pp. 122; Annemarie
Schimmel, 1980. Islam in the Indian subcontinent. Leiden: E.J. Brill, p. 129; Margaret Smith.
1994. Muslim Women Mystics: The Life and Work of Rābiʿa and Other Women Mystics in
Islam. Oxford: Oneworld, p. 216; Chaudhry Nazir Ahmad. 2002. Multan glimpses: with an
account of siege and surrender. Lahore: Sang-e-Meel Publications, p. 89.
331 Gazetteer of the Multan district, 1901–02. Lahore, p. 122.
332 Imtiyāz Ḥusain Shāh. Tazkira Awliyāʾ-yi Multan. Multan: Kutub-Khana Haji Niaz Ahmad.
(n. d.), pp. 199–200.
333 Rabia Zamaa Haẓrat Mai Safoora Qādirīyya | Facebook.
https://www.facebook.com/Rabia-Zmaa-Haẓrat-Mai-Safoora-Qādirīyya-15327962337.
334 This date is ambiguous, as 1909 makes her several centuries old.
335 Tazkira Awliyāʾ-yi Multan, pp. 199–200.
336 Rabia Zamaa Haẓrat Mai Safoora Qādirīyya | Facebook.
https://www.facebook.com/Rabia-Zmaa-Haẓrat-Mai-Safoora-Qādirīyya-15327962337.
294 Chapter 9

(7)
Sharīfa, Daughter of Muḥammad Fāzil
Period: Eighteenth Century
Place: Delhi, India

The hagiographic narrative of a young girl named Sharīfa is buried in the nar-
ratives of Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm (d. 1719), the founder of the famous Madrasa
Raḥīmyya of Delhi. This story of her incredible esoteric encounters comes
through the testimony of two towering and illustrious Sufi scholars of late
seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century India, i.e., Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm
(d. 1719) and his eminent son and successor, Shāh Walīullah (d. 1762). Shāh
Waliu’ullah gives the story in some detail in Anfāsu’l ʿĀrifīn (Voices of the
Gnostics), a book of biographies of his ancestors, which also includes his
father’s miraculous attainments and his own life written in Farsi. The work
was completed sometime before 1143/1731.337 To most of its audiences, Anfāsu’l
ʿĀrifīn is more than a hagiography. Thus, its Urdu translator lauds the work as a
treasure house of sharīʿā, mʿarifat (laws and experiential knowledge).338
Shāh Waliu’ullah in Anfasu᾽l῾Ārifīn records the most incredible anecdote
regarding Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm and his young female disciple, Sharīfa Khatūn,
daughter of one Muḥammad Fāzil.339 According to this story, Sharīfa Khatūn
was no ordinary disciple; despite her young age, she had absorbed the com-
plete reflection of her Shaikh. This gave her the power of revelations. Due to
her esoteric powers, several unseen events were manifested (munkashif) to
her. One evening, when Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm was on his way to the house of
Muḥammad Fāzil, her father, his rosary fell down from his hand. When Shāh
ʿAbdur Raḥīm arrived at Muḥammad Fāzil’s house and explained about his lost
rosary, Sharīfa told Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm that she could see the spot where the
tasbiḥ fell down. Someone went there with a candle, looked for it, and found
it. In another instance, one day while sitting in her house, Sharīfa said that
Ḥaẓrat (Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm) was about to arrive at her house and wished to
partake of a certain dish. The dish was readied. On his arrival, Ḥaẓrat Ṣāḥib
confirmed what Sharīfa has foretold. Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz Muḥaddis (d. 1824),
son of Shāh Walīullah, confirmed this story up to this point. Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz,
once while enumerating the benefits of certain stones and wood, narrated the

337 The earliest known print of Anfāsu’l ʿĀrifīn is of 1315/1897 from Maṭbaʿ Aḥmadī, Dehli. The
work has had several editions, including translations in Urdu.
338 Farūq Qādirī, Pīr Saiyyid Muḥammad. 2007. Anfāsu’l ʿĀrifīn. Lahore: Farid Book Stall,
p. 20.
339 Shāh Walīullah Dihlawī. 1315/1897. Anfāsu’l ʿĀrifīn. Dihlī: Maṭbāʿ Aḥmadī, pp. 64–66.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 295

story of one Muḥammad Murtazā’s pet pair of cranes. This narration reminded
him of Muḥammad Murtazā’s sister, Sharīfa. Referring to Sharīfa more respect-
fully as Bī Sharīfa, Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz described her as sāḥib-i tawajjuh (master
of spiritual focus) and sāḥib-i kashf (master of esoteric knowledge) and as one
who received faiz (benefits) from his grandfather. He also expressed his deep
respect for her pīr and said that she would prepare his favourite food for him
to eat. Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz personally knew Muḥammad Murtazā, the younger
brother of Sharīfa Khatūn and the same person who was sent to get the lost
rosary of Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm.340
Shāh Waliu’ullah recounts another incredible miraculous power of Sharīfa
Khatūn. One day, when Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm was present in her house, she told
him that Khalīfa Fatḥ Muḥammad, one of the closest friends (yarān-i-qadīm)341
of Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm, was about to arrive at her house. She then described
with such perfection the details of where he was exactly at that time as if she
was watching him with her eyes. She said that Khalīfa Fatḥ Muḥammad was
talking with someone. This man was standing under a shed, while Khalīfa Fatḥ
Muḥammad was standing under sunlight. Then she said, “Now he has bought
three oranges, one for you and two for his sons. Now he has changed his mind,
two for you and one for his two sons. He is now standing right at the door.” Fatḥ
Muḥammad later confirmed the details of the story.
Shāh Waliu’ullah finally relates one more strange anecdote which he heard
from Sharīfa Khatūn. One day while Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm was at her house, she
requested of him that she desired to see his heart (mī kāham ki dil-i Ḥaẓrat rā
ba bīnam). At this, Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm told her to sit in front of him (pesh-i
man ba nashīn) and focus her tawajjuh (spiritual concentration) on him. As
she focused, she went into a trance (ghaybat) and in this state she saw as if she
had slipped inside his throat and his heart looked like a mirror. From this heart,
the size of one arm in length and an open fist in breadth, the Essence of Allāh
(ism-i zāt) manifested in colours such as those that appear when the flames
of a lamp fall upon a mirror. Because of having intense love for Allāh (shah-
ghaf), she took the luminous reflection in her mouth (āṅ shoʿla ra bādāhāṅ
giraftam) and swallowed it. At that very moment, Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm felt rest-
less, fainted, and became unconscious (beqarār shudand wā ghashī kardand
wā bihosh uftād). Regaining his consciousness, he told her that as she took the

340 Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz. Malfūzāt Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAzīz (including Kamālāt-i ʿAzīzī) (Translated
by Maulawī ʿAzmat Ilāhī). Meerut: Maṭbaʿ Hāshmi, 1897. [First published in 1896],
pp. 166–167.
341 Anfasu᾽l῾Ārifīn, p. 66.
296 Chapter 9

inner soul of his heart (laṭifā-yi dil)342 into her throat (baḥalaq), he felt weak
(beṭāqat shud).343
Similar to several other narratives about women in Sufi accounts, this account
is also told with a male perspective and with the purpose of highlighting the
attainments of Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm. Anfāsu’l ʿĀrifīn includes a large number
of such incredible hagiographies. In the context of women’s spiritual experi-
ences, this anecdote, which the author also describes as “strange” anecdote,
raises several questions in the context of Shāh Walīullah’s views on women’s
baiʿat. This episode relates incidents of close proximity between Shāh ʿAbdur
Raḥīm, the young girl, and even with Khalīfa Fatḥ Muḥammad. They all met
frequently in an environment where no veiling or segregation was observed.
Indeed, Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm sat in close physical proximity to her and a cur-
tain to segregate the two is not mentioned in the episode. Shāh ʿAbdur Raḥīm
died in 1719 and Shāh Walīullah authored most of his works, including Anfāsu’l
ʿĀrifīn in 1732/1733, almost twenty-three years after his father’s demise. Sharīfa
Khatūn was alive when Anfāsu’l ʿĀrifīn was written. Thus, it may be assumed
that though she was young when the above strange events took place, she was
mature in age at the time of recording these events. Despite Sharīfa Khātūn’s
intense shahghaf and her esoteric qualities, Shāh Waliu’ullah leaves her story
incomplete, as obviously he was not interested in Sharīfa Khatūn the person.
Anfāsu’l ʿĀrifīn was created to record the kashf wa karamāt of his father and
not to glorify a woman whose spiritual attainments are exploited to illuminate
the performance of his father. Sharīfa Khatūn, at best, remains a prop. One
wonders how different this story would have been if Sharīfa Khatūn were of a
different gender.

(8)
Bībī Walīya
Date: D. 19 Jamādiu’l awwal 1149/25 September 1736
Place: Phulwari Sharīf, Bihar, India

Narratives of Bībī Walīya, the most celebrated mystic woman of Phulwarī

Sharīf, Bihar, are found in two biographical accounts of the Sufis of this region.
The first source, in Persian, is by Muḥammad Abu’l Ḥayāt Qādirī (date not
known), a Sufi of Phulwarī Sharīf, near Patna in Bihar. His biographies of Sufis

342 Laṭīfā is a term used by the Sufis for any sign or influence, which has such a mysterious
effect on the heart that cannot be expressed in words.
343 Anfāsu’l ʿĀrifīn, p. 64.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 297

of Bihar is titled Tazkiratu’l kirām (Memoirs of the nobles).344 In this compen-

dium, reference to Bībī Walīya is found in two places. The first account is under
the subheading Zikr Ḥaẓrat Muḥammad Makhdūm ʿĀlam, the husband of Bībī
Walīya.345 The second narrative in the same work is a separate account of Bībī
Walīya under the heading Zikr Ḥaẓrat Bībī Walīya quds sirraha (an account
of Ḥaẓrat Bībī Walīya, may her grave be hollowed)346 The second source,
Āsarāt Phulwari Sharīf mausūm bā Aʿyān-i-waṭn, written in Urdu by Saiyyid
Muḥammad, is a biographical account of 224 Sufis, divines, theologians, schol-
ars, and government officials of Phulwari Sharīf.347
Bībī Walīya, the most celebrated Sufi of Phulwarī Sharīf and known for her
ecstatic utterances, was born in Amjhar Sharīf348 in a pious family which traced
its lineage to ShaikhʿAbdul Qādir Jilānī of Baghdad (d. 1166).349 Her father, Shāh
ʿAzīzu’d-Dīn Amjharī, was a celebrated Sufi. She was married to her maternal
cousin, Ḥaẓrat Muḥammad Makhdūm ʿĀlam (1093/1681–1173/1759), a resident
of Tajia, Phulwari Sharīf.350 Ḥaẓrat Muḥammad Makhdūm ʿĀlam, a Sufi, was
one of the perfect saintly friends (yarān-i-kāmilīn) of Maulānā Rasūlnumā
(1087/1676–1166/1753) from whom he acquired exoteric and esoteric knowl-
edge. Maulānā Rasūlnumā conferred upon him khilāfat.351 The couple had a
son, Ḥaẓrat Shāh Muḥammad Shāh Āyatullah ‘Shorish’ (1126/1714–1210/1796) a
poet who composed in Urdu and Farsi.352
Bībī Walīya’s spiritual powers lay in her utmost devotion to Shaikh ʿAbdul
Qādir Jilānī. Her spiritual connection with the Shaikh was so strong and over-
powering that it enabled her to provide solutions to the most difficult situa-
tions. Often, her husband would seek her help to provide answers to the most
challenging queries which she did successfully as a blessing of the Prophet and

344 Muḥammad Abu’l Ḥayāt Qādirī. Tazkiratu’l kirām. Lucknow: Maṭbaʿ Anwār-i-
Muḥammadī. n. d.
345 Ibid, pp. 69–73.
346 Ibid, pp. 78–81.
347 Maulānā Ḥakīm Saiyyid Muḥammad Shuʿaib. Āsarāt Phulwarī Sharīf mausūm bā
Aʿyān-i-waṭn. Phulwarī Sharīf: Dāru’l isharāt Khānqāh Mujībīyya, 1947.
348 Amjhar is a village in District Jamui of Monger Division of Bihar.
349 Āsarāt Phulwarī Sharīf mausūm bā Aʿyān-i-waṭn, p. 59; for the ancestry of the Amjharī
Sufis, see ʿAbdur Razzāq, ʿAṭāʾ Ḥusain. 1302/1884. Kanzu’l Ansāb. Bombay: Maṭbaʿ Ṣafdarī,
pp. 26, 10–11.
350 Āsarāt Phulwarī Sharīf mausūm bā Aʿyān-i-waṭn, p. 59.
351 Tazkiratu’l kirām, pp. 69–77. For a short biographical sketch of Maulānā Shāh Saiyyid
Muḥammad Wāris Rasūlnumā, see ῾Abdu`s Salām Nʿumānī, Tazkira Mashāʾīkh-i Banaras.
Banaras: Maktaba Nadwatu’l Maʿārif, 1961, pp. 40–51.
352 Āsarāt Phulwarī Sharīf mausūm bā Aʿyān-i-waṭn, p. 60.
298 Chapter 9

of Shaikh ʿAbdul Qādir Jīlānī. She had taken the oath of allegiance at the hands
of Ḥaẓrat Rasūlnumā Qādirī Banarsi (d. 1166/1752–1753).353
Once when her husband, Ḥaẓrat Muḥammad Makhdūm ʿĀlam, was suffer-
ing from dropsy or oedema (istisqāʾ) and all the known physicians could do
nothing to cure it, Bībī Walīya spent three days and nights seeking the bless-
ings of Shaikh Abdu’l Qādir Jilāni. The Shaikh appeared in person before her,
consoled her, and recited some verses of the Qurʾān for the quick recovery of
her ailing husband. The Shaikh also gazed at her and at once the doors of eso-
teric knowledge were opened for her, and all of a sudden, she achieved the
highest stations (ānan fānan tarqqī darajāt). Within no time she reached the
station of a friend of Allāh (martabā-i wilāyat) with infinite mukāshafat (direct
witnessing of Allāh).354
Another incredible hagiographical episode of her spiritual excellence
related by Abu’l Ḥayāt Qādirī is about the completion of the shajra of her fam-
ily which was lost during the military inroads of Bargis, the Marathas. Ḥaẓrat
Muḥammad Makhdūm ʿĀlam, her husband, requested her to supplicate to the
Prophet for the recovery of their lost shajra. Bībī Walīya complied and as she
was blessed in abundance with the Prophet’s kindness and bounty (az bas mau-
rid luṭf wa ʿināyat būd), the Prophet ordered that each member of Makhdūm
ʿĀlam’s family should present himself and call out clearly his and his father’s
name. Bībī Walīya wrote down all the names in order and thus handed to her
husband his complete shajra. Later, when the lost shajra document was recov-
ered and was compared with the one that was compiled at the orders of the
Prophet by Bībī Walīya, no difference was found.355 This episode shows that
she was the recipient of the Prophet’s favours. Because of this special status,
Bībī Walīya came to be known as kalīmatu’r-rasūl (one who speaks with the
Prophet).356
Though she did not have formal education, Bībī Walīya miraculously had
command of three languages, Urdu, Persian, and Arabic, in addition to the
local dialect. She composed verses in Persian and Urdu.357 Her mystical tract,
Mʿālūmāt-i-Walīya, is preserved in the Khānqāh Mujībīyya in Phulwarī
Sharīf.358 She passed away on 19 Jamādiu’l awwal 1149/25 September 1736
and was buried in Maqbara-i Junaidīyya.359

353 Tazkiratu’l kirām, pp. 4–12; Āsarāt, p. 60.

354 Tazkiratu’l kirām, p. 79.
355 Ibid, pp. 80–81.
356 Tazkiratu’l kirām, p. 81.
357 B.S. Chandrababu & L. Thilagavathi. 2009. Woman: Her History and Struggle for
Emancipation. Chenai: Bharathi Puthakalam, pp. 210–11.
358 Khuda Bakhsh Library Journal, no. 153, 2008, p. 66.
359 Tazkiratu’l kirām, p. 81; Āsarāt, p. 60.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 299

9.9 Sufi Women of the Nineteenth Century

(1)
Bībī Ḥusnu
Period: Late Nineteenth Century
Place: Amroha, UP, India

Maḥmūd Aḥmad ʿAbbāsī’s Tazkiratʾul kirām- Tārīkh-i-Amroha, jild sānī, which

is a biographical compendium of Sufis of Amroha, includes only one brief
account of a Sufi woman in a list of about two hundred male Sufis and schol-
ars. This notice is on Bībī Ḥusnu, who hailed from Punjab and probably later
settled in Muradabad, now in Uttar Pradesh, India. In her youth, Bībī Ḥusnu
took the oath of allegiance (baiʿat) at the hands of Maulānā Saiyyid Amānat
ʿAlī Chishtī (d. 1280/1864), a Chishtī Sufi of Muradabad. Saiyyid Amānat ʿAlī
Chishtī left Muradabad in 1814 and came to Amroha along with his followers.
His shrine exists in the area of Hajiwala Bagh in Amroha. His devotees, most of
whom are local weavers, look after the shrine.360
Bībī Ḥusnu lived a low-profile life and spent her days in a house built of sun-
baked bricks. As she lived alone and had no family of her own, the weavers of
the neighbourhood, who were her devotees, looked after her. Local legends say
that she lived long and died at a ripe old age. She was buried at the feet of her
Shaikh, Maulānā Saiyyid Amānat ʿAlī Chishtī, where her shrine continues to
shower blessings upon whoever comes to visit her to pay homage.361

(2)
Māʾī Khadīja
Period: Early Nineteenth Century
Shrine: Katbar Sharīf, Lahri, Balochistan, Pakistan

Māʾī Khadīja was the illustrious daughter of a renowned pious person, Miāṅ
Muḥammad Kāmil (d. 1239/1823),362 whose family was settled at Chattar and
Lahri, a part of the Kachhi area in Balochistan. Miāṅ Muḥammad Kāmil was a
cultivator by profession and a Sufi by the Grace of Allāh. His shrine in Katbar
attracts a large crowd of devotees even today. Miāṅ Muḥammad Kāmil and his
wife, Bībī Ḥurmat Khatūn, had several children. Their son, Miāṅ Muḥammad
Kamāl, was also a man of saintly virtues.

360 Maḥmūd Aḥmad ʿAbbāsī. 1932. Tazkiratʾul kirām-Tārīkh-i- Amroha, jild sānī. Dehli:
Maḥbūbul maṭāb῾ Barqī Press, pp. 188–191.
361 Ibid, p. 228.
362 For an account of his life, see Inʿām-ul Ḥaqq Kausar. 1986. Tazkira Sufiyā-yi Balochistān.
Lahore Urdu Science Board, pp. 246–256.
300 Chapter 9

Māʾī Khadīja was born in Ghotki, Sindh. She was married to the son of Māʾī
Nihāl Khātūn, a female disciple of Miāṅ Muḥammad Kāmil. Widowed after one
year of marriage, young Māʾī Khadīja returned to her natal family. Under the
influence of her parents who were of the Qādirīyyā Sufi silsila, Māʾī Khadīja fol-
lowed a life of austerity, spending most of her time in prayers and meditation.
A local tradition says that at the time of her father’s death, Māʾī Khadīja
laughed loudly. On being asked the reason, she said, “The Prophet was here.”
Of the several miracles associated with her, one relates that once driven by
hunger caused by drought and shortage of rainfall, one khalīfa Mullā Bachchā
Katbar, an attendant of Ḥaẓrat Miāṅ Muḥammad Katbar, her brother and a
highly revered person, approached Māʾī Khadīja to help him. Māʾī Khadīja told
him to go to the arid area of Koh Gorhi, near Katbar, dig out roots of a certain
plant from the sand there, and live on them. She also told him not to tell any-
one, least they would vex her. Obeying the command of the august lady, the
khalīfa did what he was ordered to do. Reaching home, when he opened the
sack of roots, to his surprise, instead of the dried roots that he had packed,
he found millet, jowār! Her brother, Miāṅ Muḥammad Ḥayāt,363 a Sufi and the
successor (sajjādā-nishīn) of Miāṅ Muḥammad Kāmil, used to seek her advice
and used to instruct his disciple as well to seek her spiritual guidance. He used
to tell her, “All good things come from you.” She used to lay great emphasis on
seeking Allāh’s Bounty and Grace for relief from worldly needs and for spiritual
bliss.364 Members of her family and her devotees visit her shrine to seek her
blessings. Devotees continue to visit her shrine even today.

(3)
Nūr Bāʾī
Period: Mid-Nineteenth Century
Place: Tando Muhammad Khan, Sindh, Pakistan

Although local Sufi accounts of Sindh record the presence of mystic women,
Nūr Bāʾī appears only in the travel account of Richard Burton (1821–1890), an
employee of the East India Company and a spy who spent years exploring the
region, which he looked at with colonial contempt.365 Burton records an eye-
witness account of Nūr Bāʾī.

363 Ibid, pp. 256–258.

364 Ibid, pp. 258, 261–62.
365 Richard F. Burton. 1851. Sindh and the Races that Inhabit the Valley of the Indus. London:
Allen & Co., p. 231. For Burton’s life as a spy-traveller, see Indira Ghose. 2006. ‘Imperial
Player: Richard Burton in Sindh’. In Tim Youngs (Edited). Travel Writing in the Nineteenth
Century: Filling the Blank Spaces (pp. 71–86). London: Anthem Press.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 301

Nūr Bāʾī, perhaps a widow of one Rahimo Fakir of the Jaheja clan, was
a follower of the Naqshbandī Sufi silsila, which was well rooted in the area
around the Goonee River where she was found living on its banks.366 Burton
writes, “Her progress in the Naqshbandi path has been such that she is termed
Mashaikh (teacher) and instructs a number of pupil of both sexes. She lives in
great pomp, with no small show of respectability.”367

(4)
Bībī Shamsuʾn-nisāʾ
Date: D. 1295/1878
Place Patna, Bihar, India

Shamsuʾn-nisāʾ was the younger sister of ʿAbdur Razzāq ʿAṭāʾ Ḥusain, author of
Kanzu’l Ansāb. Her father, Mīr Saiyyid Sulṭān Aḥmad Qādirī al-Munʿamī, was
the son of a Sufi, Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Ghulām Ḥusain Chishtī al-Munʿamī, known
by his title ʿumdatu’l mashāʾikhīn Saiyyidu’l wāṣilīn.368 She took an oath of alle-
giance of the Qādirī Sufi silsila (bʿait bā ṭarīqa ʿāliya Qadiriyya) at the hands of
her grandfather. Though married and the mother of only one female child, she
was an excellent Sufi and always remained engrossed in Allāh’s remembrance
(mashghūli bāṭin būdand). A gnostic (misl-i ʿārifā), extolling Divine virtues (bā
zikr-i ilāhī tasbīḥ), Bībī Shamsuʾn-nisāʾ died at the age of fifty-six on Friday, 22
Rabiʿ-us sānī 1295/26 April 1878.

9.10 Sufi Women of the Twentieth Century

(1)
Ḥaẓrat Māʾī Nūruʾn nisāʾ Begam
Date: 1873–1974
Place: Dhok Sāhi Sharīf, near Dina, Jhelum, Pakistan
ʿUrs: April 8

Māʾī Nūruʾn nisāʾ Begam, of the ʿAwān family, was born in 1291/1873 in the
small rural settlement of Dhok Sāhi in the Jhelum district of Punjab. She is
also known by several reverential titles, such as Nūru’l ʿaṣr (the light of times),

366 Guni is the old name of the Fuleli canal. The neighbouring area of Tando Saindād Tando
Muhammad Khan is still under strong Naqshbandī influence. For the early presence of
the Naqshbandīs in Sindh, see Sāḥibzāda Abu’l-Khair Zubair, 2007. Sindh ke Sufiyya-yi
Naqshband, vol. 1. Lahore: Ziaul Qurʾan Publications, p. 71, and vol. 2, pp. 152–60.
367 Sindh and the Races that Inhabit the Valley of the Indus, p. 231.
368 ʿAbdur Razzāq, ῾Aṭā᾽ Ḥusain. 1302/1884. Kanzu’l Ansāb. Bombay: Maṭbaʿ Ṣafdarī, p. 294.
302 Chapter 9

Sarkār Dhok Sāhi Sharīf (the lady of Dhok Sāhi Sharīf), and Shamaʿ-yi ʿishq-i
ḥaqqānī (the candle of Divine love). This biographical notice is prepared with
the help of two printed works that are only available at the shrine of Māʾī
Nūruʾn nisāʾ Begam. Of these, one is her biography and the other is a collection
of her verses.369
According to local legends, one of her ancestors, Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Quṭb Shāh,
arrived from Hijaz to preach Islam and succeeded in converting the Khokars, a
local Rajput tribe, to Islam; hence her family came to be known as Quṭb shāhī
ʿAwān in honour of Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Quṭb Shāh.370
Nūruʾn nisāʾ Begam was born into a God-fearing family of farmers which
traced its ancestry to the Quṭb Shāhī ʿAwān clan of the Punjab, hailing from
Warapura, District Baramulla of Jammu and Kashmir. Her mother and father,
Māʾī Panah Bībī and Malik Mihr Bakhsh, were persons of particular piety. Māʾī
Nūruʾn nisāʾwas a precocious child, interested in learning more about her faith
than engaging in the usual playful activities of children of her age. Her dedi-
cation to Islam was so deep that each day she would recite ten chapters of
the Qurʾān. In addition to the five daily prayers, she would also offer super-
erogatory prayers. Instead of spending her time in the company of her family
members, she used to retire to a small separate small room where she would
remain awake and absorbed in remembering Allāh all through the night. As
most of her supplications and prayers were answered, she became known as
mustājabuʾd daʿwat. Several popular anecdotes and miracle stories testify to
the charismatic powers of Māʾī Nūruʾn nisāʾ while she was still a child.371 Once
her prayers saved a man from the gallows.372
Nūruʾn nisāʾ Begam showed signs of a born Sufi. From early childhood,
she used to pray at night and fast regularly, and the Divine rewarded her sup-
plications. Because of her saintly virtues, even as a child she was popularly
addressed as Faqīrnī Ṣāḥiba.373 As a child with great physical charms, her fam-
ily called her Baggi, a local term for a beautiful girl. Later, as her spiritual affili-
ation with Baŕelah Sharīf, an affiliate of Chishtī silsila, finally chiselled her into
a Sufi with excellent virtues, her devotees began to address her as nūru’l ʿasr
(the light of her times).

369 Muhammad Majeed. 1999. Jagtai rahay Kahani. Lahore: Nadeem Younis Printers; Shamaʿ-i
ʿishq by Ḥaẓrat Maīʾ Nūruʾn nisāʾ Begam (Edited by Baba Muḥammad Siddique Miskīn).
Jhelum, n. d.
370 Jagtai rahay Kahani, p. 32.
371 Ibid, p. 36.
372 Ibid, p. 37.
373 Faqīrnī is the feminine of the word faqīr, which though means a poor person but is used
to describe a person of abstinence and piety.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 303

As early as age thirteen, Māʾī Nūruʾn nisāʾ was already experiencing spiritual
states of sakr and jazb. Overpowered by Divine love, she would often wander
into the woods, reciting self-composed devotional verses. It is said that she
would walk such long distances that her shoes would get torn. As she grew up,
her family arranged for her marriage. She was already betrothed to her cousin
in childhood. It is said that on her wedding day, as soon she arrived at her hus-
band’s place, she left it within minutes. The marriage was not consummated
and thus she lived a celibate life.
Soon, she left her home and moved to live in a thatched place in the nearby
jungle. Her women followers and disciples also followed her. From the thatched
quarter, Māʾī Sāḥiba, as she was now known, moved to live in an old open grave
where she would mediate. She would eat little, hardly a small piece of bread.
Māʾī Ṣāḥiba’s deep devotion for the Divine and her love for the Prophet is
reflected in her poetry. Though not formerly educated, she composed poems
in her local Potohari dialect which are of exceptional spiritual and literary
merit. Her collection of verses (dīwān), titled Shama-e-ʿishq (Love’s Candle),
has been published by Darbar Sagri Sharif Jhelum, bearing no date. Her poetry
is received with such deep devotion that her followers continue to recite one
of her poems, called Tawba Nama (the epistle of repentance), at religious cer-
emonies. In her verses, what touches tenderly the chords of the heart is her
message beyond religious divisions created by the seekers of worldly authority
in the garb of religiosity. Much of her work still remains unpublished and is
preserved in her devotees’ memories.
Māʾī Sāḥiba was dearly loved by all, including non-Muslims. Among her
regular devoted visitors were several educated Hindus who, even after the par-
tition of the subcontinent in 1947 into India and Pakistan, remained in contact
with her through correspondence.
Māʾī Sāḥiba was a true traveler in the path of spirituality. To meet other
friends of Allāh and to connect with her devotees, she undertook several jour-
neys, often alone. She used to visit several other nearby shrines. Māʾī Ṣāḥiba’s
biographer, paying homage to the spiritual attributes of this friend of Allāh,
observes that, though born in the form of a woman, Māʾī Ṣāḥiba is one of the
mardān-i khudā (lovers of Allāh) and holds the status of mard-i ḥaqq (male fol-
lower of the Truth).374 Even after her death, this exceptional woman remains
a guiding light for many. Her shrine at Dhok Sāhi illustrates this best. During
my research assistant’s visit to the shrine in December 2018, she met with sev-
eral women, visitors, devotees, and women managers of the shrine. Supported
by generous donations, mostly given by Pakistani immigrants, the shrine is

374 Ibid, Jagtai rahay Kahani, pp. 21–22.

304 Chapter 9

managed by women alone. Most of the women attendants, who are also Māʾī
Ṣāḥiba’s followers, live on the premises. In addition to women attendants, the
shrine also serves as a shelter for homeless women. Truly, the candle of love
set aglow by Māʾī Ṣāḥiba continues as a beacon of light, erasing darkness and
enlightening the hearts of all those who visit her shrine. A significant number
of men are also her spiritual followers.

9.11 Sufi Women of Unknown Time Period

(1)
Beemā Bīwī
Shrine: Trivandrum, Kerala, India
ʿUrs: 1 Jamādiu’l-awwal

The coastline in the State of Kerala, India, has a trail of shrines, or nerchas, as
these are locally termed. Miller, who has conducted several research projects
on the Mappila Muslims375 of this region, notes that the shrine dedicated to the
memory of Beemā Bīwī is one that attracts a large number of devotees, particu-
larly on the occasion of the annual ʿurs celebrations.376 Located five kilometres
south of Trivandrum, the shrine of Beemā Bīwī is a reverential spot, as it is
believed that the first congregational Friday prayers in India were held here in
the pink-coloured Beemapally mosque, in Thiruvananthapuram, the capital of
Kerala. The shrines or the dargāh sharīf (the noble shrine) of Saiyyidʾun-nisāʾ
Beemā Bīwī (also spelt Beevi) and of her son Shihābu’d-Dīn Abu Bakr are next
to the mosque complex.377 Another source, without any supporting citation,
says that her name was Saiyyida Nizam Bīwī.378 The shrine complex turns into
a surging sea of devotees at the occasion of the annual ʿurs, known locally as the
chandanakudam maha-otsavam (the great festival of sandal-pot).379 Beemā
Bīwī’s historicity, though lost in texts, is commemorated by local legends that

375 For the arrival of Muslims in Kerala, see Shaikh Zainu’d-Dīn Mʿābari’s Tuḥfatu᾽l mujāhidīn,
originally written in Arabic in 992/1584 and translated in Urdu by Saiyyid Shamsu’llah
Qādirī. Aligarh: Sharwani Printing Press, 1942, pp. 13–19.
376 Ronald E. Miller. Mappila Muslim Culture: How a Historic Muslim Community in India Has
Blended Tradition (New York: SUNY, 2015), p. 275.
377 George Jacob. Religious Life of the Ilavas of Kerala: Change and Continuity (Delhi: ISPCK,
1995), p. 82.
378 Asghar Ali Engineer. 1995. Kerala Muslims: a historical perspective. Delhi: Ajanta Publica-
tions, p. 28.
379 The Kerala State Government declared March 10, 2016, the day of ‘Uroos at Beempally as
a regional holiday for all government offices and educational institutions. See Beemapally
Uroos festival to begin on Monday—The New Indian ….
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 305

narrate that this pious woman was a member of the Prophet’s family and that
she, along with her son now referred as Māhīn Abu’l Bakr Awliyāʾ Allāh (also
spelt Ouliya Allāh), voyaged from Arabia and disembarked on the shores of
Kerala to bless it with her spiritual powers. Local legends ascribe proselytizing
activities of the mother and son and even say that Beemā Bīwī was killed in one
such encounter.380 These oral anecdotes manifest themselves strongly during
the ten-day-long ʿurs festivities, which begin on the first of the lunar Islamic
month of Jamādi᾽ul awwal. On the first day, a colourful devotional ceremony
of the shrine’s flag-hoisting in front of a sea of devotees takes place. The surg-
ing crowd, representing a cross-section of the populace, stands there with clay
pots perched atop their heads, smeared with sandal-paste, filled with coins,
and wrapped in fragrant jasmine flower wreaths with incense sticks stuck into
the clay pots, emitting aroma. As the pots are smeared with sandal or chan-
dan, the name of the festival is chandanakudam. All through the ʿurs festivi-
ties, several public performances are scheduled which come to an end on the
final day called Chandanakudam Mahotsavam (the sandal-pot great festival)
with a procession of caparisoned elephants, green- and red-coloured sheets
(chādars), and decorated coloured umbrellas. All through the events, devotees
recite kalimā (the basic creed of Islam) and verses from the Qurʾān.381 The cer-
emony of viewing the sacred sanctum of the shrine is called dīdār (Persian for
viewing), which is somewhat equivalent to the Hindu devotees’ practice of the
darshan. The water with which the tombs are washed is distributed among the
devotees and is supposed to carry healing powers.

(2)
Bībī Fāṭima (or Bībī Ḥajiānī)
Place: Makli Hills, Thatta, Pakistan

Shaikh Muḥammad ʿᾹm Thattawī, in Tuḥfatu’l-ṭāhirīn (the gift of the holy

ones), gives a brief biographical sketch of Bībī Fāṭima (or Bībī Ḥajiānī), an
illustrious and pious woman who lived in the city of Thatta.382 It is said that on
her return from the Ḥajj pilgimage, people began addressing Bībī Fāṭima with
the honorific title of Bībī Ḥajiānī, i.e., the woman who has performed Ḥajj.

380 For more details, see V.A. Ahmed Kabeer. Muslim Monuments in Kerala. (Part 1)
(Trivandrum: Velavoor Publishing House), p. 198.
381 These scenes can be viewed at Beemapally uroos 2016 songs—YouTube https://www.you
tube.com/watch?v=GT4U7Jp_x9s.
382 Shaikh Muḥammad ʿᾹzam Thattawī. 1956. Tuḥfatu᾽l-ṭāhirīn, p. 91. Schimmel has confused
the word Hajiani with Hajrani, See Annemarie Schimmel. 1975. Mystical Dimensions of
Islam. p. 434; also see Muḥammad Iqbāl Ḥusain Naʿīmī. 1987. Tazkira-i awliyā-yi Sindh,
p. 58.
306 Chapter 9

In view of her piety and devotion, Thattawī calls her Rābiʿa-i zamāṅ (the Rābiʿa
of the Age).383
Her yearning to be close to God and earn His proximity (qurb) was so over-
powering that to remember Him constantly, Bībī Ḥajiānī used to recite the
Qurʾān continually with great devotion and passion. Her trust in the Qurʾān
was so strong that she learned all thirty chapters of the Qurʾān by heart (Qur’ān
bar zabān dāsht), and thus she was a ḥāfiza (one who has memorised the
Qurʾān). During the Ḥajj travel, each day she used to recite the whole Qurʾān
and would pray to Allāh that the reward (swāb) of the Qurʾān recitation should
go the Prophet.
A hagiographical legend about her miraculous powers, which is still popular
among the local people, narrates that on her way back home from the Ḥajj pil-
grimage, while everyone was seated in the vessel and the ship began to move,
a dark hurricane developed (bād-i tīrā paidā shud) and blackened the horizon.
The boat was soon caught in a severe typhoon (ṭūfān-i-ʿazīm). Her fellow trav-
ellers lost all hope for their survival. Agitated by fear, they approached Bībī
Fāṭima and beseeched her to rescue their lives and to pray for their safety. She
raised her hands in prayer (dast bā duʿa bardāsht) and said, “Oh God! I accept
what pleases you. These powerless beings and the distressed ones seek refuge in
your Benevolence and petition to be saved from this hurricane. Bestow Mercy
upon them.” It is said that as soon as she finished her supplication (manājāt),
the typhoon stopped suddenly and the boat and its occupants were saved.384
Richard Burton, who was present in Sindh in 1840 as an employee of the
East India Company, wrote about one of the numerous miraculous powers of
Bībī Fāṭima that he heard from the local people. Among her other miracles, the
one that he found popular was about the sea storm. He writes that the people
of the area recalled the story of Bībī Fāṭima’s spiritual powers of how she once
stilled a storm that threatened destruction to the pilgrim ship in which she was
returning home after performing the ḥajj.385

(3)
Hāro Ana
Shrine: District Loralai, Balochistan, Pakistan

Bībī Hāro Ana, about whom little is researched and known and about whom lit-
tle is written, is remembered by the Baloch tribes as a God-fearing, God-loving

383 Ibid, p. 91.

384 Ibid, p. 91.
385 Sindh and the Races that Inhabit the Valley of the Indus, p. 230.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 307

virgin and ascetic. Local legends celebrating the auspicious miracles of Hāro
Ana were probably first textualised by the colonial ethnographers and compil-
ers of gazettes while documenting indigenous religious practices. One such
documentation is by Arnold, who writes, “In the Loralai District a virgin saint,
named Hāro Ana, guards the Wanechis386 (a section of the Tarīn Afghāns)
from the incursions of their enemies.”387
Expanding on the above information, local legends say that Hāro Ana lived
the life of an ascetic virgin a few miles away from Chauter. As an expression of
reverence for her piety and abstinence from worldly attractions, some affluent
members of the Wanechi tribe gifted her some land in the Karbi Kachch area.
These lands are still in the possession of Hāro Ana’s tribe, the Tehānri. Local
anecdotes say that at the time of her death, Hāro Ana told her people that she
should be buried at a place safe from the inroads of the Dumars,388 the age-old
rivals of the Wanechis. She also made a prophecy that never again would ene-
mies dare to come to this land, but if they did, they would suffer immensely.
Thus, according to her last wish, Hāro Ana was buried four miles away from
Chauter in the Loralai District on the western banks of Wani Manda, now a
fishing stream.
Local legends ascribe several miracles to Hāro Ana. One is how through
the intercession of Hāro Ana, two hundred Wanechis succeeded in recover-
ing their livestock, which had been forcibly driven away by the thousands of
Dumars, their traditional rivals. The Wanechis made supplications at the grave
of Hāro Ana and these were answered and rewarded. Later, these Wanechis
came to be known as Hāro Ana périye (the followers of Hāro Ana).
Another narrative of the miraculous powers of Hāro Ana relates that once
when the Dumars rejected the spiritual powers (wilāyat) of Hāro Ana in

386 Wanechi has various spellings, such as Waneci, Wanetsi, and Vanechi, See Joan L.G. Baart
and Esther L. Baart-Bremer. 2001. Bibliography of Languages of Northern Pakistan.
Islamabad: National Institute of Pakistan Studies, Quaid-i-Azam University, p. 109. The
Census of India, 1901, vol. 4, records that the Wanechis of the Tarin, are found in the area
of Wani, Chauter and the Shirin Valley and have a rivalry with the Dumars, often engaging
in blood feuds with them. P. 119.
387 T.W. Arnold. 1908. ‘Saints and Martyrs (Muhammadan in India),’ In James Hastings,
John A. Selbie, and Louis H. Gray (Edited) Encyclopædia of Religion and Ethics. New York:
Charles Scribner’s Sons, p. 71.
388 The Domars (variously spelt) lived around the area of Sanjawi, considered of Kakar ori-
gin, are described by Bellew as ‘a tribe formerly very numerous, and figuring prominently
in the history of Kashmir (Rajatarangini) as a powerful and turbulent people in the coun-
try about Lahore’. See for more details, H.W. Bellew. 1891. An inquiry into the ethnography
of Afghānistan, prepared and presented to the Ninth international congress of Orientalists
(London, September 1891). Woking: Oriental University Institute, p. 122.
308 Chapter 9

derogatory expressions, Hāro Ana turned into a pigeon and began hovering
over the heads of the Dumars. So great was the power of Hāro Ana that only
three Wanechi herdsmen killed several of their rivals. Humbled in fight, the
Dumars, it is said, acknowledged the spiritual powers of Hāro Ana and turned
into her followers.389
The grave of Hāro Ana stands as a modest shrine with a few flags and a
wooden shed. Most devotees come from unassuming backgrounds. They seek
her blessings, make vows, and tie coloured threads and pieces of fabric as a
mark of reverence for the departed soul.

(4)
Māʾī Maklī
Makli Hills, Thatta, Pakistan

No other mystery is as challenging as the historicity of Māʾī Maklī, the woman

who lies buried in the Maklī graveyard in the vast necropolis of Maklī, now
known as the city of the dead rather than the thriving city that it used to be.
Describing Maklī in his Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām (completed in 1767), Mīr ʿAlī Sher
Qāniʿ wrote that there was at each step a resting place of a friend of Allāh
(mazja‌ʾ-yi awliyāʾ), and at each pace refuge of a God-fearing devout (marjaʿ yi
atqiyāʾ). Among these countless graves, by some estimates numbering more
than one hundred thousand, are reposed people of faith and reason (ahl-i
taḥqīq wā yaqīn). Along with its lost history, the genesis of the name of Maklī
also remains a subject of inquiry.390
Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qānīʿ suggests that one reason for naming the necropolis
Maklī is because a chaste, innocent and godly woman (mastūra māʿsūma az
ahlu’lallah) named Maklī is reposed close to the miḥrāb of the Maklī mosque
and that the name Maklī for the mosque was suggested by Shaikh Ḥammād,
a pious person of the fourteenth century.391 Shaikh Ḥammād’s suggestion of
naming a mosque after a woman whose only credentials were her godliness

389 The details about the life of Haro Ana are drawn from several published sources, such as
Inʿām-ul-Ḥaqq Kausar. 1986. Taẓkira Sufiyyā’-yi Balochistān. Lahore: Urdu Science Board,
pp. 54–55; Balochistan. 1979. Balochistan through the ages: Tribes. Quetta: Nisa Traders,
pp. 175–76; also see Margaret Smith. 1994. Rabiʿa the Mystic and her fellow-saints in Islam
Other Women Mystics of Islam. Oxford: Oneworld, p. 215–16.
390 Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qānīʿ Thattawī. 1304/1887. Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām, jild som. Dehli: Matba‘ Nāṣirī,
p. 184.
391 Ibid, p. 185.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 309

is a testimony of great worth as Shaikh Ḥammād ruled the hearts of men and
controlled the destinies of rulers.392
Today, few recall Shaikh Ḥammād’s testimony about Māʾī Maklī; more
emphasis is laid on lore and fables. Māʾī Maklī’s humble-looking grave, true to
what she stood for, rules the hearts of those who come here to seek her shelter
and blessings.
In 2016 when I visited the place, the rural poverty of the surrounding region
overwhelmed me. Least concerned whether Māʾī Maklī was a historic entity
or not, her devotees practiced the simple tenets of the Sufi way of life. The
woman, mythical though she might be, is real in the sense that the whole
necropolis celebrates her veiled persona. Those who trust Māʾī Maklī’s power
to heal their physical and mental wounds, bring flowers and flower petals, tie
strings, put a few coins in the cash box, and lick the blessed salt kept in plastic
bowls for them. I met at least twelve women shrine visitors between the ages of
thirty and forty. All were from around the neighbourhood and appeared feeble
in physique and weak in economic resources. Reluctant initially to share with
me what they were soliciting through the Māʾī’s intercession, a few of them
later told me privately that it was family wellbeing, health for their children,
or the birth of a son—the three major challenges of any family in Pakistan.
Frequently mothers bring to the shrine their newborn children because of
their supplications at the shrine, to offer salām (salutation). On this occasion,
the mothers will untie the thread they had tied earlier and put it around the
neck of their newborn, believing that because of the blessings of Māʾī Maklī,
their child will survive. The ritual of tying this thread around the newborn’s
neck is an assurance that from now on the child has been initiated as the life-
long disciple (murīd) of Māʾī Maklī and will be protected and shielded by her
spiritual charisma.

(5)
Mukhaddarāt Abdāliyā: Three Chaste Veiled Women Abdāl
Shrine: Thatta, Pakistan

Muḥammad ʿĀzam Thattawī, in Tuḥfatu’l-ṭāhirīn, gives a brief account of three

sisters who, true to the essence of mysticism, lived a life of abstinence and
remembering Allāh. Thattawī eulogizes them as qudsī nihādan (endowed with
heavenly virtues), ʿīṣmat qibāb (cloaked with chastity), pāk dāmanāṅ (pure),

392 Shaikh Ḥammād bin Shaikh Rashīdu’d-Dīn Jamālī wielded great spiritual powers
and claimed wilāyā (dominion) over the whole region of Sindh. For more details, see
Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām, pp. 182–183.
310 Chapter 9

and ʿiffat niqāb (covered with modesty). Living in solitude, they remained
continually engaged in Allāh’s remembrance. Though they were of the rank of
Abdāls (rutba-yi abdāl dāshtand), they kept themselves hidden from the eyes
of the people and publicity (shuhrat-i-khalq).393 Thus, they are not remem-
bered by their names, argues ʿĀzam Thattawī. Their personal identity meant
nothing to the men and women who came there to seek their blessings. All
through their lives, while the three sisters remained anonymous, their virtues
spread everywhere. Local legends say that if anyone is in trouble and needs
help, he or she should visit the shrine of these exalted persons (martaba-yi
manīʿ) with sincerity and faith (ṣidq-i niyyat) and recite Sura Yāsīn394 seven
times and make vows, then their needs (ḥājit) will be fulfilled. The three sis-
ters, possessing virtues similar to those of Bībī Maryam (Maryam ṣifatāṅ), bless
these people.395
The shrine of these three sisters is in Qandsar, a locality of Thatta.

(6)
Bībī Nānī
Shrine: Bolan, Qalat Division, Balochistan, Pakistan

Situated in the Bolan Pass, near the southern end of the Bībī Nānī Bridge, the
shrine of Bībī Nānī is a popular place “celebrated from the Euphrates to the
Ganges” as a highly revered pilgrimage site by both Hindus and Muslims.396
Captain Hart of the Bombay Infantry, in his travel account of 1840, also
describes this shrine.397 Charles Masson (1800–1853), an East India Company
soldier and also a traveller and archaeologist, discovered seven copper coins in
the Beghram region. He classified them as Indo-Scythic, saying that they “refer
to the legend of NANAIA … there are numerous shrines in these parts of Asia,
called by the Muhammedans, the Zearate of Bībī Nannī, or ‘the lady Nanee.’”
He further observed that the Hindus probably referred to her as the goddess

393 According to Sufi hagiography, Abdāls remain veiled by God.

394 Qurʾān 36.
395 Shaikh Muḥammad ʿᾹzam Thattawī. 1956. Tuḥfatu’l-ṭāhirīn. (Edited by Badr-i-῾Ᾱlam
Durrani). Karachi: Sindhi Adabi Board. p. 138; also, Muḥammad Iqbāl Ḥusain Naʿīmī. 1987.
Tazkira-i awliyā-yi Sindh. Karachi: Shāriq Publications, p. 272.
396 R. Hughes-Buller, C.F. Minchin, and Jamiat Rai. 1907. Balochistan District Gazetteer—Las
Bela: text and appendices. Allahabad: Pioneer Press, pp. 35–36.
397 S.W. Hart. 1840. ‘Some Account of a Journey from Kurrachee to Hinglaj, in the Lus ter-
ritory, descriptive of the intermediate country, and of the port of Soumeanee,’ in The
Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Vol. IX, Part. pp. 134–54.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 311

Parbati.398 Masson conjectures that Bībī Nānī may have had some connection
with the figure of Nānīa, the goddess of the old Persians and Bactrians.399 Later,
Maclean, in his study of Arabs in Sind, also proposes that the site was probably
that of “a Savite temple dedicated to the goddess, known as Bībī or Māʾī Nānī to
the Muslims and Pārvatī, Kālī or Mātā to the Hindus.”400
Whatever might have been the origin and historicity of Bībī or Māʾī Nānī,
today her devotees remember her as the one who protects them and blesses
them. It is said that Kuchiks of the Rind Baloch tribe used to offer a fixed
amount of grain to the shrine at each harvest. With this grain, sacrificial sheep
were purchased and offered to the shrine for the safe continuation of the water
channel. Bībī Nānī, thus, was revered as the guardian and protector of the water
supply by the local Muslim tribes of the region. Local tradition says that since
1895, when the ceremony of sheep sacrifice was abandoned, the water supply
in Bībī Nānī Kaur, the western tributary of the Bolan River, has decreased.401
As with most other women lost in antiquity, Bībī Nānī’s life account can be
recreated only with the help of oral traditions and the memories of those who
trust in her spiritual charisma. According to local legends, she was of Saiyyid
ancestry.402 Her father was one Yā ʿAlī.403 Hittu Ram,404 drawing upon local
traditions, writes that Bībī Rānī, being a devout believer in God and a woman
of immense virtues, never married. Some miscreants, taking advantage of her

398 Charles Masson. 1834. “Memoire of the ancient coins found in Beghram, in the Kohistan
of Kabul.” Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Vol. 28 (April), p. 172; Parvati is the con-
sort of Lord Siva, and is also worshipped as Devi, the greatest goddess. She has a great
variety of names, such as Uma, Durga, Chandi, and Kali. For more, see John Dowson,
Classical Dictionary of Hindu Mythology and Religion, Geography, History, and Literature.
Ludhiana: Lyall Book Depot, (12th ed.), pp. 86–88.
399 Charles Masson. 1843. Narrative of a Journey to Kalāt—including an account of the insur-
rection at that place in 1840; and a memoir on Eastern Balochistan. London: Richard
Bentley, p. 391.
400 Derryl N. Maclean. 1989. Religion and Society in Arab Sind. Leiden: E.J. Brill, p. 15.
401 S. Zoha. 1952. “The Physiographical Personality of Baluchistan.” Pakistan Geographical
Review, 8 (1), p. 27; also, see Baluchistan (Pakistan). 1985. Baluchistan District Gazetteer
Series. Bombay: Bombay Education Society’s Press, p. 3.
402 Families claiming descent from the Prophet Muḥammad through his daughter Bībī
Fatima.
403 Inʿām-ul-Ḥaq Kausar. 1986. Taẓkira sufiyā-yi Balochistan. Lahore: Urdu Science Board,
pp. 52–54.
404 Rai Bahadur Hittu Ram, C.I.E., Settlement Extra Assistant Commissioner, Quetta was a
trusted and loyal employee of the colonial administration. In 1893, he was assigned a spe-
cial duty to crush disturbance in the Kalāt State. For a short biography of Hittu Ram, see
Roper Lethbridge. 2005. The Golden Book of India: a genealogical and biographical dic-
tionary of the ruling princes, chiefs, nobles, and other personages, titled or decorated of the
Indian empire. Delhi: Aakar Books (first published in 1883), p. 177.
312 Chapter 9

loneliness, attempted to dishonour her. Seeing no other way to protect her-

self from the mischief of these villains, she invoked Allāh’s mercy. Soon, the
earth opened up and swallowed her. People, on coming to know of this, raised
a grave over the spot where she vanished. Within no time, the grave turned
into a venerated shrine. Those whose supplications and vows were answered
distributed nān (oven-baked flattened bread) to the shrine visitors as a mark of
gratitude. Since then, Bībī Nānī came to be known by the epithet Bībī nānwālī
(the lady of the nāns), which soon changed into Bībī Nānī.405

(7)
Bībī Nekzan
Shrine: Ziarat, Qalat, Balochistan, Pakistan

Similar to the lives of most other women who lived a life of piety and absti-
nence, Bībī Nekzan’s life remains little known.406 According to local legends,
this pious and virtuous woman, who was not a native of Balochistan, arrived
from elsewhere to settle there. Once, while travelling, some non-Muslim ban-
dits waylaid her and her husband. As all pleading went in vain, she prayed
to Allāh for protecting her honour. As soon as she finished her supplication,
the earth opened and swallowed her. Arnold (1869–1930), known for his long
association with the Indian Muslims, particularly through the Aligarh Muslim
University, refers to her as Bībī Nāhzan and presents this legend with little
variation. He writes, “Bibi Nāhzan, who sank into the earth together with her
maid when they were persecuted by some infidels, is visited by persons who
have been bitten by mad dogs, and those who pay a fixed contribution to the
shrine to secure immunity from cholera.”407 Margaret Smith also recounts the
same story.408 Inʿām-ul Haq Kausar’s narrative is little different from that of
Arnold. He writes that when the highway robbers attacked Bībī Nekzan and
her husband, Bībī Nekzan prayed to Allāh saying, “I am a feeble sinner (ẓaʿīfā
gunahgār) but I am of the community of Muḥammad (ummat-i-Muḥammadi).
O’ Allāh! Thou alone are the Protector of my honour and respectability, for
the sake of Muḥammad, save us from imprisonment at the hands of these

405 Hittū Rām, and Saleem Akhtar. 2012. Tārīkh-i Balochistān. Lahore: Sang-i Meel Publications
(First published in 1907), p. 275.
406 Nekzan, a Persian word, which means a good woman.
407 T.W. Arnold. 1908. ‘Saints and Martyrs (Muhammadan in India),’ In James Hastings,
John A. Selbie, and Louis H. Gray (Edited) Encyclopædia of religion and ethics. New York:
Charles Scribner’s Sons, p. 71.
408 Margaret Smith. 1994. Rabiʿa the Mystic and her fellow-saints in Islam. Oxford: Oneworld,
p. 212.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 313

non-believers, and from disgrace and agony.” The supplication was answered
and the earth swallowed them up. People of the area built a shrine at the spot.409
About the sanctity of the shrine of Bībī Nekzan, Bray, in his Census of
Baluchistan (1911), writes that “no one may sleep on a bedstead in the village,
though it [the shrine] lies a mile or so away.”410 The shrine of Bībī Nekzan con-
tinues to attract devotees and visitors.

(8)
Pānch Bībī kī Dargāh
Dabhoi, Vadodara District, Gujarat, India

In the Annual Report of the Director of Archaeology, Baroda State for the years
1934–1935, a reference to a historic site found in a dilapidated and neglect-
ful state led to the identification of a shrine dedicated to five virtuous sisters,
Pānch Bībī (five respected women).411
The discovery of this shrine was purely by chance. While the survey work
was in progress for several areas of the historic Baroda fort, a close investi-
gation of the Baroda citadel’s wall finally resulted in this discovery. Although
the actual shrine was not found, what led to the confirmation that there once
existed a dargāh commemorating five pious women was based on finding
several inscribed stone slabs, most of which were covered by thick coats of
whitewash.412 Major portions of this dargāh built in stone were found in such
a bad condition that Hirananda Sastri, the compiler of the report, commented
that the “fragmentary or ruinous” state hindered any work of repair.413
I have included the above narrative—which is far too obscure and blurred
and obviously is of little help in reconstructing the lives of these five women
Sufis—to show how damage caused by negligence and disrespect towards his-
tory and heritage deprive us of the knowledge of much of our past.414

409 Inʿām-ul Ḥaq Kausar. 1986. Tazkira sufiyā- yi Balochistān. Lahore: Urdu Science Board,
pp. 55–56.
410 Denys Bray. 1913. Census of India, 1911, vol. 4, Baluchistan. Calcutta: Superintendent Govern-
ment Printing, p. 63.
411 Hirananda Sastri. 1936. Annual Report of the Director of Archaeology, Baroda State: 1934–
35 (-year ending 31st July, 1939). [Place of publication not identified]: Baroda State Press;
also, Hirananda Sastri. 1940. The Ruins of Dabhoi or Darbhavati in Baroda State. [Baroda]:
Baroda State Press, p. 2.
412 Ibid, p. 5.
413 Ibid, p. 2.
414 For recent destruction, plunder, and arson of dargah and mosques in Gujarat see, District
wise Detail of Damage to mosques, dargahs etc in Gujerat … www.ummah.com › Forum ›
Learning Area › Learn about Islam.
314 Chapter 9

(9)
Māʾī Qadam
Dargāh: Thatta, Pakistan
ʿUrs: 25 Shaʿbān

Māʾī Qadam is also known as Jījā Mīrāṅ. No information is found in books

about her life. Local traditions say that she lived several centuries back and
used to sell milk during the day in Thatta and at nightfall she was miraculously
transported to Makkah with her milk vessels. Because of her powers to travel,
devotees come here to seek her blessings before travelling. Her shrine is built
inside a mosque which is also named after her, Mā’ī Qadam Jamaʿ Masjid. The
grave looks recently built.

(10)
Ḥaẓrat Rājī Laulashtī
Place: Bijapur, India

Ḥaẓrat Rājī Laulashtī was one of the virtuous and pious women of Bijapur.
Muḥammad Ibrāḥim Zubairī Qādirī Shaṭṭārī, an early nineteenth-century his-
torian who compiled reliable biographical notices of Sufis of Bijapur, with the
help of written sources that are now extinct and oral traditions that he gath-
ered from the descendants of Sufis, in his Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur (com-
piled in 1825) writes that Ḥaẓrat Rājī Laulashtī was an ʿārifa with excellent
virtues. Not much is recorded about her life. Zubairī, however, refers to a mys-
tical legend which narrates that the night she was buried, a thief approached
her grave with the intent of stealing her coffin. The thief lost his eyesight as
soon as he touched the grave. The date of her demise is not known.415 Ḥaẓrat
Rājī Laulashtī lies buried outside the western wall of the shrine of Ḥabīb Allāh
Sibghat Allāhī (d. 1632).

(11)
Saidānī Bībī or Nādān Bībī
Shrine: Mahekar, District Buldhana, Amravati Division, Maharashtra, India

Close to the dargāh of Punch Pīr (five pious persons) in Mahekar, Maharashtra,
is the dargāh of Saidānī Bībī or Nādān Bībī (the innocent lady).416 Men are not
allowed to enter the precincts of the shrine. Childless women come here to

415 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, pp. 223–224.

416 Locally this area is known as pariyā kā thānā.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 315

make vows, and once they get a child they return with offerings of thanksgiv-
ing. Women who make wishes here hang green glass bangles and green sheets
of fabric around the shrine.417 There was a dispute over the income of the
shrine and a lawsuit was filed in 1996 with the Madras High Court.418 A recent
press report highlighted the role of this shrine in creating public harmony in
the area.419

(12)
Shāh Parioṅ jo Āsitāna (Shrine of the King Fairies)
Place: Makli, Thatta

Some eighty kilometres east of Karachi, near Thatta, stands Makli Hill, known
for its vast cemetery consisting of the graves of more than 125,000 Sufis and
other luminaries. To Mīr Sher Ali Qānīʿ (1727–1788),420 this was not merely the
resting place of the Sufis and of those who feared Allāh; to him it was jilwāgāh-i
Imāmīn (a display platform of the saintly leaders).421 Some of these tombs are
now crumbling into dust; some are marked while others bear no name.
Here, within a walled enclosure, close to the grave of Saiyyid Shāh Ḥusain
Shāh Bukhārī, are two graves, known as the graves of two chaste and pious
women. They were the adopted daughters of Saiyyid Shāh Ḥusain Shāh and
are popularly known as kings of fairies—Shāh Parioṅ. Qānīʿ, in his Makli
Nameh, written in Persian in 1760–1761, gives a glimpse of the grandeur of the
grave enclosure of the āsitāna (a saint’s tomb/a place for resting) and of the
charm of its female visitors (ʿālam-i inās),422 whose “sight raises a resurrec-
tion of the strength of the sight seers.”423 Qāniʿ, however, was less interested

417 Roy Burman, J.J. 2002. Syncretic Shrines and Communities. New Delhi: Mittal Publications,
p. 110.
418 EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF THE MASJID E FARKHUNDA
www.the-laws.com/Encyclopedia/Browse/Case?CaseId=216991777000.
419 Dargah dedicated to woman centre of harmony—Deccan Herald.
www.deccanherald.com › District, Aug. 8, 2013.
420 Mīr Sher ʿAlī Qāniʿ (1727–1788) was born in Thatta and is buried in Makli. Commissioned
by the Ghulām ʿAlī Shāh Kalhoŕā, Qāniʿ wrote the history of the Kalhoŕas, Ṭuḥfatu’l-kirām.
421 Mīr Sher ʿAlī Qāniʿ. 2011. Makli Nameh or Bostān Bahār. (Translated by Dr. N.B.G. Qazi).
Karachi: Sindh Archives, p. 59. A Jilwa-gāh, as defined by Steingass, in addition to its
meaning as the world, also as a bride’s chamber in which she is unveiled by her husband,
see A Comprehensive Persian-English Dictionary.
422 Plural of Arabic word unsā, meaning female.
423 Makli Nameh or Bostān Bahār, p. 44; also see, A. Schimmel, 1983. Makli Hill: A Centre of
Islamic Culture in Sindh. Karachi: Institute of Central and West Asian Studies, University
of Karachi.
316 Chapter 9

in writing more about Shāh Parioṅ and does not tell who was buried in these
graves. Saiyyid Ḥusamuddīn Rashdi, who edited the Makli Nameh, also does
not offer any details about them. Thus, the names of the Shāh Parioṅ remain
unknown. During my visit to Thatta and Makli, I met Abu’l Sirāj Muftī Ṭufail
Aḥmad Thattawī, imām of the Dargāh of ʿAbdullah Shāh Asḥabi, Makli, Thatta,
in February of 2016 and again a month later. He was kind enough to explain
the history of these two women and also gave me, as a gift, two of his books
in Urdu.
Rejecting the popular myth that these two women were fairies, jinns, or
some superhuman beings, Abu’l Sirāj Muftī Ṭufail Aḥmad told me that once
a caravan of travellers stopped near Saiyyid Shāh Ḥusain Shāh’s abode. One
of the travellers of this caravan brought two ailing sisters suffering from some
mysterious disease to seek his blessings. Shāh Ṣāḥib, being a person of loving
and caring nature, asked the parents of the two girls to leave them with him.
He then took them to his home and said to his wife, “Look here, I have brought
two fairies for you. Look after them.” The two grew into healthy, saintly beings.
Soon these sisters were blessed with the charismatic powers of healing and
curing anyone who would come to them to seek their blessings. At the time
of his death, Saiyyid Shāh Ḥusain Shāh willed that his two adopted daughters
should be buried next to him.424
At the shrine, visitors related another legend which said that these two little
girls were the sisters of the seven sisters buried at Sattioṅ jo āsitāno. Later, as
these two sisters miraculously grew wings and could fly, they came to be called
fairies and were buried separately here.
The mazār of the Shāh Parioṅ is under the custody of the Department of
Archaeology, Government of Sindh. Devotee women told me that the Shāh
Parioṅ were of the family of Ḥaẓrat Sulaimān (the Prophet Solomon) who is
believed to control the jinn (genii). There is a square-shaped hallowed portion
of the floor at the foot of the graves of Shāh Parioṅ. Devotees take out a small
piece of rock lying inside, lick it, and put it back there. They take out the dust
from this hole and rub it on their hands and faces. It is believed that this dust
has the power of blessings and those who touch it are blessed with health and
wealth. I saw all the visitors rubbing the leftover oil of the lamps on their faces,
hands, and heads. Women who believe that they begot babies by the blessings
of the Shāh Parioṅ bring their child for saluting the pious sisters. On this occa-
sion, they offer live fowl to the shrine.

424 ʿAbul Sirāj Muftī Ṭufail Aḥmad Thattawī. 2008. Tuḥfat-uz zāʾirīn. Thatta: Darbār Ḥaẓrat
Saiyyidna ʿAbdullah Shāh Aṣḥābi, pp. 151–2; also see by the same author, Jadīd makli nāma.
Thatta: Aṣḥābī kitāb ghar (2010), pp. 94–95.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 317

At the feet of the graves of Shāh Parioṅ, there are two graves of their male
attendants. People visit them also with great reverence. The khalīfa of the
shrine, a male, told us that the Shāh Parioṅ travel from one place to another
in order to receive the petitions of their devotees. To facilitate this, he told me
that there are several āsitānas of the Shāh Parioṅ in cities such as Karachi,
Lahore, and Faisalabad. I have visited one such āsitāna within the shrine com-
plex of the darbār of Māʿī Mirāṅ in Karachi.
Although men are barred from entering the shrine premises, there were sev-
eral of them inside the shrine. Menstruating women’s entry is strictly banned.
I saw that a woman guard was asking women about their status and those
who were menstruating were asked to step back. All the women present at
the shrine unanimously believed in the great charismatic powers of the Shāh
Parioṅ. The shrine thus acts as a therapy centre and heals the devotees by rais-
ing their hopes for a solution to their miseries, which are many.

Figure 8 Shrine of Shāh Parioṅ jo Āsitāna (Shrine of the King Fairies), Makli, Thatta. The
chicken brought as a gift is roaming around in the background
318 Chapter 9

Figure 9 A woman devotee is presenting her infant for treatment to the spiritual healer,
Shāh Parioṅ

Figure 10 A devotee holding a piece of salt to lick for spiritual healing at the shrine of Shāh
Parioṅ, Makli, Thatta
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 319

(13)
Bībī Saiyyidānī or Ḥaẓrat Saidānī Ṣaḥiba
Shrine: Bangalore (now called Bengaluru), Karnatika, India
ʿUrs: 15 Rabi῾u’l awwal

The shrine of Bībī Saiyyidānī, daughter of Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Madni of Ullāl and
wife of Ḥaẓrat Tawakkal Mastān Bābā Suhrawardī, spiritual successor of Bābā
Fahkhru’d-Dīn of Penukonda in the Anantpur district of Andhra Pradesh (d.
1295), is on Richmond Road in Bangalore. Bābā Fahkhru’d-Dīn introduced the
Suhrawardī Sufi silsila in South India. No details about Bībī Saiyyidānī could
be found in any text. Hundreds of women, mostly childless, visit her dargāh
to seek her blessings. They address her as Māji (the Mother) out of devotion
and affection, and thus establish familial ties of mother-daughter relationship.
The devotee women tie coloured ribbons around the nearby trees and hang
coloured bangles as their offerings.

(14)
Bībī Shaikhī Durkhānī
Place: Quṣūr, Punjab, Pakistan

Bībī Shaikhī Durkhānī was a Ḥusainza‌ʾī Pashtūn, whereas her husband

belonged to the Baduza‌ʾī clan. ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī, her only biographer, writes
in Akbāru’l awliyāʾ min lisānu’l aṣfiyyāʾ (Tales of friends of God as a tribute to
the pure ones) that Bībī Shaikhī Durkhānī, a person of deep piety, would fast
frequently and pray all through the night. Kheshgī’s account is considered
reliable and trusted, first because Bībī Shaikhī Durkhānī was a member of his
community of the Afghānī /Pashtūns of Quṣūr, and secondly because his other
writings, thus far, are considered undisputed. Thus, drawing upon his knowl-
edge and experiences of his community and the tales he had heard, Kheshgī
writes that Bībī Shaikhī Durkhānī, similar to persons who consider this world
transitory and are always prepared to depart for their journey like a traveller on
his way (misl-i musāfirān), would remain ready for the journey (tahīya-i safar).
When people enquired about the secret (sirr) of this preparedness, she would
tell them, “I am waiting for Allāh’s Angel of Death (muntazir paik-i ilāhī am).
I do not know when he would arrive.”425
Another thing about her that puzzled onlookers was that she would not
light a lamp near her, even in the darkness of night. When people asked the

425 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fols. 124 a & b. This same notice is in Kheshgī’s other work,
Maʿāriju’l wilāyat, completed in 1094/1683. MS. No. R344, Iqbal Mujaddidī Collection,
Punjab University, Lahore, fol. 653b.
320 Chapter 9

reason (ḥikmat) for doing this, her answer was, “If one is void of inner Light
(nūr-i bāṭinī), then what is the use of an external light (roshni zāhiri)?” She
would also tell them that if one is blessed with the inner Light, the external
light, then, is of no use.
Bībī Shaikhī Durkhānī was often heard saying that a grandson would be
born who would be named Ayyūb and would be blessed with several children
and wealth. This happened exactly as per her predictions.426
It is sad that Kheshgī gives no clue to draw any inference about the time
period of this excellent Sufi. Probably she lived sometime in the sixteenth or
seventeenth century, a time period which coincides with the arrival of the
Pashtūn settlers to Quṣūr. A mere conjecture, however, is not sufficient enough
to assign a firm date.

(15)
Bībī Shaikhzādī
Place: Multan/Uchch, Pakistan

Bībī Shaikhzādī belonged to the family of Khwāja Yaḥyā Kabīr (d. 834/1430).427
She was married to one Miyāṅ Turmān, son of Miyāṅ Dūdū. Two most trusted
historians, Khwāja Niʿmatu’llah and ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī, say that she was a
perfect gnostic (ʿārifa-yi kāmila) and always remained busy in prayers and
remembrance of Allāh (ṣāḥib-i riyāẓat wa mujāḥida),428 and fasted regularly
and continuously without breaking it in the evening (rozā-yi wiṣāl).429
Although Bībī Shaikhzādī remained engrossed in remembering Allāh and
showed no interest in her wifely duties, her husband, Miyān Turmān, treated
her with great respect and reverence (taʿzīm wa takrīm). However, as she con-
tinued to be occupied only by her mystical experience (maghlū’l ḥāl), her hus-
band could not bear it any longer and secretly remarried (khufiya zan-i diagr
nikāḥ dāshta). After some time, Bībī Shaikhzādī discovered the secret mar-
riage and said to him, “O Turmān! I see that your eyesight is gone now.” Miyāṅ

426 Ibid.
427 For short biographical notice on Khwāja Yaḥyā Kabīr, a disciple of Saiyyid Jalālu’d-Dīn
Bukhārī, see Khwāja Niʿmatu’llah bin Khwāja Ḥabību’llah al-Harāwī in Tārīkh-i khānjahānī
wa Makhzan-i Afghānī pp. 723–40.
428 Ibid, p. 827; Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fol. 128a.
429 The Prophet has decreed against continuous fasts. The Prophet said, “Do not practice
Al-Wisal (fasting continuously without breaking one’s fast in the evening or eating before
the following dawn).” The people said to the Prophet, “But you practice Al-Wisal?” The
Prophet replied, “I am not like any of you, for I am given food and drink (by Allāh) during
the night.” See Ṣaḥiḥ al-Bukhārī, Book 3o, Ḥadīth 68, vol. 3, Book 31, Ḥadīth 18.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 321

Turmān went to her father and complained against her. A few days later, Miyāṅ
Turmān fell critically ill, lost his vision, and soon died.430
Surprisingly, neither Khwāja Niʿmatu’llah nor ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī, who were
basically interested in recording the history of the Pashtūns, tell us about the
place or date of birth or death of Bībī Shaikhzādī.

(16)
Bībī Ṣāḥiba Surkhposh
Period: Not known
Place: Delhi

A hagiographical story of this saintly woman is found in only one source,

Tārīkh Awliya‌ʾ-i Dihli (1935), under the heading barguzīdā múmin nekʿauratoṅ
kā bayān (an account of saintly, believing, and virtuous women). Presumably,
she belongs to the early days of the arrival of the Muslims in India. According
to a legend, she arrived from Ghazni to the city of Delhi along with her brother.
When her brother, along with his other companions, was martyred in a battle
with nonbelievers (kuffār), she was left alone. She prayed to Allāh to protect
her honour and soon the earth took her in and only a small part of her red
scarf was left out; hence her name is Bībī Ṣāḥiba Surkhposh, the lady covered
in red.431

(17)
Bībī Tārī
Place: Maklī Hills, Thatta, Pakistan

The story of Bībī Tārī, a pious woman of Sindh, presents the essence of
taṣawwuf as it was understood by God-wary women. Shaikh Muḥammad ʿĀzam
Thattawī, in Tuḥfatu’l-ṭāhirīn (the gift of the holy persons), adopted a nontra-
ditional way of presenting the lives of the Sufis. Instead of setting a separate
section for Sufi women or submerging them within the narratives of the male
Sufis, he included their life histories according to the places of their origin or
burial. Thus, in the first of the two sections of his book, awliyāʾ Allāh ki dar koh
Makli wa shahr Thatta āsūdā and (friends of Allāh buried in the Maklī Hills or

430 Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī, p. 827–28; Akbāru’l awliyāʾ, fol. 128b.
431 Maulawī Aḥmad Sāʿīd. 1354/1935. Tārīkh Awliyāʿ-i Dihlī. Maḥbūbu’l-maṭābʿ Barqī Press,
Dihlī, p. 144.
322 Chapter 9

Thatta), ʿĀzam Thattawī presents the narratives of Bībī Tārī and Bībī Fāṭima
(aka Bībī Ḥajiānī).432
Introducing Bībī Tārī as nek zan (virtuous woman), ʿĀzam Thattawī says that
she was born in Thatta and was a scion of the famous Soomra dynasty (1024–
1351).433 Fear of Allāh (khauf-i ilāhī) was so deeply ingrained in her that she
would weep and cry (girya) all the time. Like a true Sufi, engrossed in Allāh’s
remembrance, she would never lie down or recline to even take a short nap,
and would continually sit with her skirt wrapped around her legs (hamwarā
pā-i khud-rā ba-dāman paichīda nishasti) which she never stretched or straight-
ened (darāz) and thus avoided falling into deep sleep. Whenever overpowered
by sleep, she would rest against a wall. When fully awake, she would keep gaz-
ing at the sky above, and with tears flowing down like a stream, she would
pray like a humble slave, submitting in total obedience to Allāh. This reminds
us of the rules laid down by the great Sufi Shaikh Abu’l Najīb Suhrāwardī (d.
663/1168) in his kitāb ādābu’l-murīdīn (book of rules for the novices) under the
heading of rules for sleeping. Suhrāwardī writes that when sleep overpowers, a
Sufi sits up against a wall and fasts during the day.434 Bībī Tārī, a Sufi of excel-
lent virtues, with tears streaming from her eyes, would look up towards the sky,
seeking Allāh’s mercy, and would implore, “O’ Allāh thou are the Merciful who
has kept me protected (masʿun dāshta) from all misfortunes ( jamiʿ āfāt) while
I am a forgetful creature (bandā-i-ghaflam) who forgets you all the time (hamā
waqt tirā farāmosh dāram).”
Her everyday schedule tells us that she never forgot Allāh. In addition to the
fasts of Ramaẓan, she used to fast frequently. It is said that to break her fast, she
would eat a little from a half-filled bowl of broth (nīm kāsā-yi āsh). To make the
broth tasteless (be-zāʾiqa), she would pour more water in it. Whenever a per-
son in need (ahl-i ḥājit) would come to her, she would pray for him or her. The
Grace of Allāh answered all her prayers. Known to the local people as walīyya
(female friend of Allāh), Bībī Tārī lies buried in the graveyard of Thatta, a few
steps away from the grave of Ḥaẓrat Shukru’llah Shīrāzī, great-grandfather of
Mīr Alī Sher Qānīʿ (1725–1789), the author of Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām.435

432 For Bībī Tārī, see ʿᾹzam Thattawī. 1956. Tuḥfatu’l-ṭāhirīn. (Edited by Badr-i-῾Alam Durrani).
Karachi: Sindhi Adabi Board, p. 48.
433 Ibid, p. 48. For the history of the Soomra rule, see Mīr Muḥammad Marsūm. Tārīkh-i Sind
ma‘arūf bih Tārīkh-i Maʿṣūmī.
434 Bandā Nawāz, and Saiyyid ʿAṭā Ḥusain. 1939. Tarjumā-i ādābu᾽l-murīdīn (Persian transla-
tion of Suhrawardī’s Arabic work adāb al-murīdīn). Ḥaidarābād: Maṭbūʿa-i Intizāmī, p. 35.
435 Tuḥfatu᾽l-ṭāhirīn, p. 48; also, see Iʿjāzu’l-ḥaqq Quddūsī. Tazkira-yi Ṣūfīyya‌ʾ-yi Sindh, 329–
30; Muḥammad Iqbāl Ḥusain Naʿīmī. Tazkira awliyā-yi Sindh, pp. 47–8; Muftī Abu Sirāj
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 323

Later historians have retold the story of Bībī Tārī without adding any new
information about her life. Thus, as with most other women included in this
text, Bībī Tārī also remains little known. Pious women like Bībī Tārī do not
need to be designated as a walī by a shaikh or a pīr; people know their worth
and endorse their wilāyat. I hope that someday some researchers would find a
lost record to establish the chronological data about Bībī Tārī.

(18)
Turta-turt Bībī
Place: Trichinopolly, India

In Bahār-i ʿĀzam Jāhī, an early nineteenth-century travel diary of the pilgrim-

age of ʿAzam Jāh Bahādur Nawāb Wālājāh IV of Carnatic (1820–1825), account-
ing the lives of the male Sufis of Nathar Nagar,436 brief biographical notices of
some Sufi women are also included. Of these, Turta-turt Bībī is one such pious
woman.437 Turta-turt appears to be a popular title and not the real name of
this pious woman as the word in the local Deccani language means “in haste”
( fī’l-faur). Her grave, which was located close to the mote alongside the gate of
Nathar Nagar at the time of Walājah’s pilgrimage, seems to belong to a much
earlier period. A hagiographical tradition says that when the foundations of
the city were dug, suddenly blood began to ooze out (khūn jārī shud). On exca-
vating deeper, a grave appeared which was believed to be of this chaste, veiled
woman (mastūra-yi ʿiffat nishāṅ), who was reposing in eternal peace there in
a white dress (bā-libās safaid bākhwāb rāḥat ast). The diggers, amazed and
shocked, immediately covered the ground (māʿan pinhāṅ sākhta) and repaired
the grave. Paying tribute to this saintly woman, Ghulām Qādir Nāzir, the com-
piler of the travel diary, comparing her to Rābʿia al-ʿAdawiyya, says that she was
in the category of men of Allāh (ba ṣaf-i rijāl Allāh). Lamenting that virtuous
persons like her are gone into the dust of obscurity (darīṅ khāk tīra rafta), he

Muḥammad Ṭufail Thattawī. 2010. Jadīd Makli nāma. Hyderabad: Hydri Printing Press,
pp. 57–58.
436 The city of Trichinoplly was renamed as Nathar Nagar by the Walajahs in honour of Sufi
Nathar Wali (969–1039). See Madras District Gazetteers, Trichinopolly, vol. 1. Calcutta:
Government Printing Press, 1907, p. 338; T.W. Arnold. 1913. Preaching of Islam. A History of
the Muslim faith. London: Constable & Co., p. 267. Susan Bayly. 1989. Saints, Goddesses, and
Kings: Muslims and Christians in South Indian Society, 1700–1900. Cambridge [England]:
Cambridge University Press, p. 164.
437 Bahār-i ʿᾹzam Jāhī of Ghulām ʿAbdu’l-Qādir Nāzir. 1961. Edited by Muhamamd Yusuf
Kokan Usmani. Madras: Electric Press, p. 178.
324 Chapter 9

says all traces of their existence are lost till they gather again on the day of res-
urrection (ḥashr wa nashr).438
The above short narrative, part of the daily diary of a royal pageant, dra-
matically turns into a thesis on the lost and buried histories of Sufi women.
When discovered, they still remain veiled (mastūra). Their identity does not
lie in their given or known names; nor do their family links and connections
matter. Significant in the above short notice is that Nāzir accords the highest
status that historically men have been conferring upon the pious and virtuous
women, that is identifying them as a man (rijāl), thus echoing ibn al-ʿArabī’s
praise of Rābiʿa that “when a woman becomes a ‘man’ in the path of God, she
is a man and one cannot call her a woman.”439
The grave of Tura-turt Bībī was covered immediately. The caravan moved
forward. The story was recorded and forgotten. After a long gap, a woman
scholar, Jaweda Habib, mentioned her in 2002 in her history of the Sufis of
Tamilnadu written in Urdu.440 Ghulām Qādir Nāzir, however, has included a
similar story of chance discovery of the grave of a male Sufi, Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid
Ḥasan Qadirī, also known as Pīr Ghāʾib Ṣāḥib, in his travelogue. In this story,
the tomb of Pīr Ghāʾib Ṣāḥib was struck when at the orders of Nawab Zu’lfiqār
Khan Bahadur Nuṣrat Jang, the governor of Carnatic, the wooded area around
Tanjore was being cleared. The grave was damaged and blood oozing out like
water out of a fountain scared the labourer. The Nawab also felt concerned.
That night, the Pīr appeared in the Nawāb’s dream, narrated his story, and
questioned why he was disturbed in his sleep. He also told him that the grave
would now be marked by a bunch of fresh flowers lying on top of it. Next morn-
ing, the Nawab went to the spot, recognised the grave by fresh flowers lying
on the grave, and immediately ordered the construction of a domed mauso-
leum. Nawab Wālājāh I established a special endowment for the shrine’s main-
tenance. Later, during the controversial governorship of George Pigot,441 the
Raja of Tanjore reduced the endowment.

438 Belief in ‘gathering on the Day of Resurrection is obligatory for Muslims as it is part of
faith (īmān), see sura 4:87Also, for Al-Ghazali’s exposition of this Qurʾānic concept, see
Gianotti, Timothy J. 2001. Al- Ghazalī’s unspeakable doctrine of the soul unveiling the eso-
teric psychology and eschatology of the Iḥyā. Leiden: Brill, p. 170.
439 A.J. Arberry. 1979. Muslim saints and mystics: episodes from the “Tadhkirat al-Auliya”
(“Memorial of the Saints”). London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, p. 18.
440 Jaweda Habib. 2002. Tārīkh Awliyāʾ-yi Tamil Nadu. Chenai: Urdu Publications, p. 60.
441 During the governorship of Madras under George Pigot (1755–63) great political tussles
happened. Pigot amassed huge fortunes. Later, in 1777, he died in captivity. For Pigot’s
life, see Sudip Bhattacharya. 2013. The Strange Case of Lord Pigot. Newcastle upon Tyne:
Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women by Time Period 325

(19)
Ḥaẓrat Zachchā Bībī
Period: Not known
Shrine: Thanjavur, Karnataka, India
ʿUrs: 12 Rabiʿus Sāni

Another reference to another shrine named after Zachchā Bībī is found in the
early nineteenth-century pilgrimage diary of 1238/1823, Bahār-i ʿĀzam Jāhī, of
ʿĀzam Jāh Bahādur Nawāb Wālājāh (1820–1825). On his pilgrimage tour from
Madras to the shrine at Nagore in the Thanjavur District, the Nawab arrived at
the gates of the fort of Chanji, also known as Nusratgaŕh. Before entering the
city, the Nawab stopped at the well-known (shuhrāh darad) shrine of Zachchā
Bībī to pay homage and seek her blessings. Regarding the miraculous powers
of Zachchā Bībī, Ghulām ʿAbdu’l-Qādir Nāzir, the scribe of the diary, observes
that her charisma and munificence continues greatly to this day (tā ḥāl
karāmat wa faiz-i ōu is qadr jārī ast). Whoever makes supplications (istimdād)
at her mazār with sincere faith (bā-ḥusn-i ʿitiqād) has all of them granted by
her mercy (raḥmat).442
Her name, Zachchā, is of great significance. It is a Persian word that means
a woman who has recently delivered and is in her postpartum period. In all
probability, this could not have been her real name. True to the meaning of
her known name, Zachchā Bībī is associated with pregnant women and
women who have delivered recently. Thus, she remains until today the patron
of women who are about to deliver or have recently delivered. Bayly, quoting
an unpublished source, the basis of which seems to be oral traditions, writes
that this pious woman “comes in the vision of the delivering women and helps
them in their times of distress.”443 Appearance of a sufi and virtuous person
in the dream of a Muslim woman at the time of birthing or during the forty
days of postpartum bleeding (nifās) is a significant reference because in most
tradition-bound Muslim societies, women during postpartum are usually
associated with some form of bodily pollution and their touch and presence
is avoided.444 Contrary to these negative traditions, in this instance a birthing

442 Bahār-i ʿᾹzam Jāhī of Ghulām ʿAbdu’l-Qādir Nazir. 1961. Edited by Muhammad Yusuf
Kokan Usmani. Madras: Electric Press, p. 142.
443 Susan Bayly. 1989. Saints, Goddesses, and Kings: Muslims and Christians in South Indian
Society, 1700–1900. Cambridge [England]: Cambridge University Press, pp. 134–35.
444 For further details and a modern perspective on this issue, see Marrion Holmes Katz,
Prayer in Islamic Thought and Practice. New York: Cambridge University Press (2013), also
by the same author, Body of text: the emergence of the Sunnī law of ritual purity. Albany:
State University of New York Press (2002).
326 Chapter 9

woman is glorified and is offered homage by a large number of male and female
devotees through the memory of Zachchā Bībī.445
Today, the shrine is located inside the compound of a government hospital
in the Thanjavur district and is regularly visited by patients of the maternity
ward. Bayly comments that this dargāh is “particularly interesting for its suc-
cess in bridging the gulf between the world of modern ‘scientific’ medicine,
and the traditions of healing associated with the pir and his barakat.”446

(20)
Bībī Zulaikhā
Date: Unknown
Place: Gulbarga

Maulawī Muḥammad Sulṭān, in his account of the Sufis of Gulbarga,

Armughān-i Sulṭānī al-maʿrūf sair-i Gulbarga (1924), writes that in 803/1400 on
his arrival from Delhi in Gulbarga, Khwāja Gisū Darāz went first to visit the
shrine of Shaikh Sirāju’d-Dīn Junaidī (d. 781/1379).447 On his way back from
shrine visitation, Khwāja Gisū Darāz stopped for the ziyārat at the shrine of
a pious woman (ʿaurat-i ṣāliḥa), Bībī Zulaikhā. As soon as he approached the
grave, he heard a female voice reciting the Qurʾān coming from inside the
blessed grave (marqad-i mubārak). The Shaikh commented, “Good women do
not let their voice be heard by unrelated men (nā maḥram). As soon as these
words were uttered, the voice stopped.”448
The above narrative is not found in any other text. I could not find any
other evidence, archaeological or otherwise, in support of the existence of Bībī
Zulaikhā’s grave. The fact that Khwāja Gisū Darāz is reported to have visited
another female Sufi’s shrine on his arrival in Gulbarga encourages accept-
ing the authenticity of Bībī Zulaikhā. Bībī Zulaikhā might have arrived in the
Deccan during the earlier exodus of Sufis from the north to the Deccan about
whom much information remains missing.
445 Jaweda Habib. 2002. Tārīkh Awliyāʾ-yi Tamil Nadu. Chenai: Urdu Publications, p. 38.
446 Susan Bayly. 1989. Saints, Goddesses, and Kings: Muslims and Christians in South Indian
Society, 1700–1900. Cambridge [England]: Cambridge University Press, pp. 134–35.
447 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-i Bijāpur, p. 126.
448 Armughān-i Sulṭānī, 161.
 Chapter 10

Biographical Notices of Sufi Women according to

Their Specific Status

10.1 Sufi Women Khalīfas

(1)
Ḥaẓrat ʿAjība Khānam
Period: Mid-Eighteenth Century
Place: Panipat
Shrine: Panipat, India

In the late eighteenth-century Sufi chronicles, Ḥaẓrat ʿAjība Khānam emerges

as one of the khalīfas of the Delhi-based Naqshbandī Sufi Shaikh Mirzā
Mazhar Jān-i-Jānāṅ (martyred in 1195/1780 at the hands of a religious fanatic)
to instruct and guide women disciples of the Naqshbandī-Mujaddidī silsila of
the Sufis. Born at a time of intense political chaos, economic ruination, and
social mayhem that engulfed the North Indian Muslims, ʿAjība Khānam’s life
presents a picture much different from other Muslim women of her time.
ʿAjība Khānam’s father was a resident of the historic city of Panipat, near
Delhi. Though his name is not found, we know that he was a well-off man with
a large heart and Sufi leaning, and had strong devotional affiliations with Mirzā
Mazhar Jān-i-Jānāṅ,1 the Naqshbandī- Mujaddidī Sufi Master.2 Thus, grow-
ing up in a household familiar with the Naqshbandī ṭarīqa of Mirzā Mazhar,
ʿAjība Khānam’s devotion towards Mirzā Mazhar is not surprising. Another
and rather exceptional fact about ʿAjība Khānam is that compared to most
other Muslim women of eighteenth-century India, she was an educated per-
son. Further, contrary to the tradition of her contemporary society, ʿAjība
Khānam used to write letters and correspond regularly with Mirzā Mazhar and
his wife, Mardum Maḥall, who was also Mirzā Mazhar’s disciple and khalīfa for
women only.3 Mirzā Mazhar and his wife’s relationship with ʿAjība Khānam

1 He gifted ten bīghas of land to Mīrzā Lalan, an adopted son of Mīrzā Mazhar Jān-i-Jānāṅ.
See Maḥmudu᾽l Ḥasan ʿĀrif, Tazkira Qāzi Muḥammad Sanāʾu’llah Pānīpatī. (Lahore: Idara
Sharāfat-i Islamiyah, 1995), p. 238.
2 For the life of Mīrzā Mazhar, see Shāh Ghulām ῾Alī Dihlawī. Maqāmāt-i-Mazharī. (Dihlī:
Maṭbaʿ Mujtabāi᾽1309/ 1892).
3 Ibid, p. 63.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_012

328 Chapter 10

was more than that of a master-disciple relationship. Mirzā Mazhar treated

her as his daughter and therefore in his letters to her, written after her mar-
riage, he affectionately addressed her farzand-i bar-khwur-dār (my child with
good fortune),4 or simply as Bahū Jīū (the blessed daughter-in-law). Thus,
long before ʿAjība Khānam attained spiritual virtues, she was already a woman
whose life was much different from most women of her time.
Sometime before 1166/1753, ʿAjība Khānam was married to Ḥaẓrat Sanāʾu’llah
Pānīpatī (d. 1225/1810), a Sufi scholar and a disciple and khalīfa of Mirzā
Mazhar.5 Sanāʾu’llah was a man of great virtues, the most important virtue
being his generous heart in sharing his wealth with others. In view of Mirzā
Mazhar’s close proximity to the two families, i.e., that of ʿAjība Khānam and of
Ḥaẓrat Sanāʾu’llah Pānīpatī, Mirzā Mazhar might have arranged the matrimo-
nial match of Sanāʾu’llah and ʿAjība Khānam, though we have no evidence.6
Interestingly, although ʿAjība Khānam had good relations with her husband,
took care of his personal needs, and bore him three sons and two daughters,7
Sanāʾu’llah took another wife, Rābiʿa Khānam.8 The second wife also per-
formed baiʿat at Mirzā Mazhar’s hands.
Life for ʿAjība Khānam with a co-wife and a powerful mother-in-law must
have been a challenging one. Her mother-in-law, Bādshāh Begam, addressed
as Begamī Ṣāḥib by Mirzā Mazhar, was an accomplished daughter of Nawāb
Luṭfu’llah Khan Bahādur Ṣādīq of Panīpat who held the rank of 7000 at the
Mughal court.9 Similar to most other women of her time, ʿAjība Khānam
experienced conflicts in her wedded life. However, so great was her con-
fidence in her spiritual mentor, Mirzā Mazhar, that instead of fighting with

4 See Letter No. 132 in ῾Abdur Razzāq Qureshi. Makātīb Mirzā Mazhar. (Bombay: ῾Alawī Book
Depot, 1966), p. 191.
5 Maḥmudu᾽l Ḥasan ʿĀrif. 1995. Tazkira Qāẓī Muḥammad Sanāʾu’llah Pānīpatī. Lahore: Idāra
Saqāfat-i Islāmiyya, p. 238. For his life also, see Maqāmāt-i Mazharī, pp. 65–68.
6 Qāẓī Sanāʾu’llah’s mother whom Mirzā Mazhar used to address as Begamī Ṣāḥib and Qāẓī
Sanāʾu’llah brothers and sons had taken an oath of allegiance at the hands of Mīrzā Mazhar.
7 Maḥmudu᾽l Ḥasan ʿᾹrif. 1995. Tazkira Qāzī Muḥammad Sanāʾu’llah Pānīpatī, Lahore: Idāra
Saqāfat-i Islāmyya, p. 238; also, see Letter No. 25, p. 34 in Makātīb Mirzā Mazhar, which
relates that she would get new dresses prepared for her husband and send these to him even
while he was travelling. Her sons, Maulawī Aḥmadu’llah (d.1784), Maulawī Sibghatu’llah and
Maulawī Dalīlu’llah were also deputies of Mīrzā Mazhar.
8 Makātīb Mirzā Mazhar, p. 142; also, Maqāmāt-i Mazharī [(Urdu translation by Muḥammad
Iqbal Mujaddidī). Lahore: Urdu Board, 2001], p. 402, f. n. 26.
9 For Luṭfu’llah Khan, see Later Mughals by William Irvine ((Reprint, 1991), Delhi: Atlantic
Publishers), p. 131 &190, and Denzil Ibbetson. Gazetteer of the Karnal District—1883–84
(Lahore: Arya Press,1884), p. 153.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 329

her tormentors, she would seek solace by complaining to him and seeking his
advice.10 One such quarrel with her husband drove her to report it to Mirzā
Mazhar, who rewarded her with a unique honour—authorization for her to
instruct and enrol women disciples in the Naqshbandī ṭarīqa.
We do not know the nature of the complaint lodged but we can understand
its seriousness. ʿAjība Khānam’s hurt was so intense that as a strategy to seek
solace and peace of heart she chose to present herself at the House of Allāh in
Makka. It could also be that to distance herself from her husband, she decided
to go on a Ḥajj pilgrimage with her son. The fact that her husband was unsuc-
cessful in his efforts to dissuade her from this journey and then sought Mirzā
Mazhar’s mediation to stop her, convinces us further that the intended journey
of ʿAjība Khānam had more meanings than just pilgrimage.
Concerning ʿAjība Khānam’s journey on the path of the Naqshbandī ṭarīqa,
scarce information emerges. We do not know when or at what age she entered
the discipleship of Jān-i-Jānāṅ—before or after her marriage. One can only
conjecture that it may have happened while she was unmarried as her father
was also a disciple of Mirzā Mazhar. However, it can also be argued that, as in
most cases, unmarried girls usually were not encouraged to undertake initia-
tion, she may have entered formal discipleship after her marriage.
However, we do know that ʿAjība Khānam was very close to her Shaikh who
once wrote to her husband that “Bahū Jīū lives constantly in my thoughts.”11
Ḥaẓrat Shāh Ghulām ʿAlī Dihlawī (d. 1240/1824), a disciple and the first khalīfa
of Mirzā Mazhar Jān-i-Jānāṅ, writes that ʿAjība Khānam, the noble wife of
Maulawī Sanāʾu’llah, gained inward knowledge ( fayyūẓ-i-bāṭini) from Mirzā
Mazhar. She was also well versed with the mystical notions of existence and
nonexistence ( fanāʾ wa baqāʾ). Her constant engagement with Sufi practices,
such as repetition of Allāh’s names, submission to the Divine, and medita-
tion (waẓāʾif, iṭāʿat, zikr wa murāqaba) turned her into a favourite and accom-
plished disciple of Mirzā Mazhar. Because of these accomplishments of ʿAjība
Khānam, Mirzā Mazhar wrote a letter to her permitting her to instruct women.12
This letter was in response to two other earlier letters, one from ʿAjība
Khānam and the other from her husband, Sanāʾu’llah Pānīpatī, to Mirzā Mazhar.
Muḥammad Naʿīmu’llah Bahrāʾīchī (d. 1218/1802), a khalīfa of Jan-i-Janāṅ,
in Bishārat-i-Mazahriyyā, presents this letter under the heading dar zikr-i

10 See letter No. 40, p. 55 in Makātīb Mirzā Mazhar in which Mirzā Mazhar enquired with
displeasure about the tense relations with her mother-in-law over the issue of the mar-
riage of ʿAjība Khānam’s son.
11 Makātīb Mirzā Mazhar, Letter No. 119, p. 176.
12 Maqāmāt-i Mazharī, (Dihlī: Maṭbaʿ Mujtabāi᾽1309/ 1892). p. 68.
330 Chapter 10

aḥwāl wālida mājida makhdūmzāda hāʾi ʿālīmiqdār Maulawī Dalīlu’llah wā

Aḥmadu’llah sallamāha tāʿalā (narration about the noble mother of Maulawī
Dalīlu’llah and Aḥmadu’llah, the dignified sons of the Makhdūm).13 The com-
plete text of the letter is also included in Makātīb Mirzā Mazhar.14 Let us now
look at the contents of the letter.
Addressing ʿAjība Khānam as farzand-i bar-khwurdār (long live my child),
Mirzā Mazhar wrote that he had received two letters from her, informing him
of her intention to proceed on a Ḥajj pilgrimage due to her annoyance with her
husband. To find out the reasons of ʿAjība Khānam’s distress, he considered it
appropriate to discuss the matter with the Maulawī Ṣāḥib (her husband) and
her sons. He told her that he held the right to counsel her on what was best,
and that if she considered him wise and just (ʿāqil wā munṣif) she should follow
his advice. Continuing further, he said that generally all the hateful and pain-
ful things caused by human beings are indeed the results of our own actions
( jazāʾ ī ʿāmāl mā ast). Assuring her that he was on her side, he then gave her
several pieces of advice. First, no one will treat her badly if she treats her elders
respectfully and the younger ones with love and affection. Second, happiness
in this world and in the hereafter ( falāḥ-i dīn wā dunyā) depends upon obedi-
ence (iṭāʿat) and service (khidmat) to a husband. Third, rage and anger (ghazab
wā ghuṣṣa) must be controlled and use of improper words (kalimāt nālāʾiqa)
must be avoided. Fourth, prayers must be offered regularly (taqqayad dar
namāz bāyad kard). Finally, he said that if she follows the above, no one would
ever dare to harm her. Regarding her intention to go for Ḥajj, Jān-i-Janāṅ said
that no Muslim would ever stop another Muslim from this if the pilgrimage
were mandatory for the person. He then declared that, as Ḥajj was not binding
upon her (bar shumā farẓ nīst), she should act on his advice and not proceed
on the pilgrimage. Next, he offered condolence on the recent demise of Bībī
Ammatu’l Batūl, ʿAjība Khānam’s sister, saying that he was intensely grieved by
her passing away and had recited the whole Qurʾān for (the forgiveness) of her
soul. He then, consoled her by saying that her (sister’s) state there (in the other
world) was good (aḥwāl-i- oū dar āṅjah khūb ast).15

13 Fozail Ahmad Qadri. “Edition of Bisharat-i-Mazhariyah.” (Unpublished dissertation of

Master of Philosophy, Centre of Advanced Study, Department of History, Aligarh Muslim
University, Aligarh, 1981), pp. 523–24.
14 Makātīb Mirzā Mazhar, Letter No. 132, p. 191.
15 Letter no. 132, Makātīb Mīrzā Mazhar, p. 191. Mirzā Mazhar in a letter to ʿAjība Khānam’s
son, Maulawī Aḥmadu’llah, dissuading him from proceeding on Hajj, argues that pil-
grimage is not mandatory if it violates the rights of parents and wife. See Makātīb Mirzā
Mazhar, Letter no. 136, p. 196.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 331

The last paragraph of the letter then authorised ʿAjība Khānam to instruct
women in the Naqshbandī ṭarīqa. He wrote, “If women wish, and ask for your
attention, then it is permitted by me (wa agar mastūrāt tawfīq yāband wa az
hamā tawajjuh khwāhand, ijāzat ast). It is highly hoped from the masters of the
Naqshbandī ṭarīqa that it [her efforts] will be effective. Whenever I have given
tawajjuh to you, I have noticed success. Keep yourself constantly engaged in
the remembrance of Allāh (bā zikr-i-ilāhī), and in following the traditions of
the Prophet. It is necessary to protect the rights of others and to inculcate good
habits as these cause reputation and success.”16
There is no evidence to show how and where ʿAjība Khānam acted as
Jān-i- Jānāṅ’s khalīfa. Combining two different issues, i.e., the dispute with her
husband and the authorization to act as a Naqshbandī guide, raise queries
regarding the true nature of this permission. Ijāzat nama, or letter of authori-
sation, is a significant document and usually follows a fixed format, which is
not visible in this letter. Was this permission a stratagem to appease her and
stop her from her intended pilgrimage? These queries do not intend to ques-
tion ʿAjība Khānam’s spiritual attainments or to cast any negative reflection
on the intent of Mirzā Jān-i- Jānāṅ. The queries are valid, however, and have a
significant and key connection with the debated issue of women’s status and
position in institutionalised Sufism.
Ḥazrat ʿAjība Khānam stands as a unique figure in the annals of late
eighteenth-century South Asia. At the time of receiving this honour, ʿAjība
Khānam was a woman of mature age, the mother of two adult sons who already
had acquired formal education to qualify themselves for being addressed as
Maulawī and were married. Indeed, the elder son, Maulawī Aḥmadu’llah, was
also conferred khilāfat by Mirzā Mazhar.17 In an era when women were con-
demned for promoting shirk and bidʿat, ʿAjība Khānam was an example of how
women, through their learning and mystical experiences, could gain higher
status in Sufi hierarchy and change men’s estimation of women as ignorant
beings. Her power of resistance was one such example. Regrettably, nothing
further about her saintly virtues is yet known to us.

16 Ibid, Letter no. 132, p. 191.

17 Maqāmāt-i Mazhari, p. 67. For a brief notice on Ḥaẓrat ʿAjība Khānam, also see Muḥammad
Nazīr Ranjha. Tārīkh wa tazkira khānqāh Mazharīyya Naqshbandīyya Mujaddidīyya.
(Lahore: Mushtaq Printers, 2010), p. 258.
332 Chapter 10

(2)
Ḥaẓrat Bānu Zuhrā Khatūn
Date: B. 1861
Place: Kharera, Murshidabad, Bengal, India

Ḥaẓrat Bānu Zuhrā Khatūn, known as Rābiʿa of Bengal, was a perfect virtuous
person of her time.18 Because of her piety and ascetic life, Bānu Zuhrā Khatūn
is one of the celebrated Sufis of Bengal.19 Ḥaẓrat Zuhrā Khatūn belonged to
a family of Sufis, scholars, and reformers. Her grandfather, Sufi Saiyyid Wāris
ʿAlī, also known as Saiyyid Wāris ʿAli Bengali, believed that eradication of extra
Islamic practices was much needed for Islam’s rejuvenation in India. He joined
Saiyyid Aḥmad Shahīd Barelwī (1786–1831) and was one of his most trusted and
prominent lieutenants in his jihad campaigns in the Swat region where he died
in action at Panjtar.20
Ḥaẓrat Bānu Zuhrā Khatūn was the daughter of Ḥaẓrat Fatḥ ʿAlī Wāʾisī
(1825–1886) and Fāṭima Khatūn. Ḥaẓrat Wāʾisī, who hailed from Chittagong,
was a Naqshbandī Sufi, an acknowledged scholar of Arabic and Persian and a
mystic poet of great merit. He was also known as Rasūl-numā.21 Ḥaẓrat Wāʾisī
earned this epithet because all those who followed him were blessed with
seeing the vision of the Prophet in a dream or in meditation. He had taken
his oath of allegiance at the hands of Sufi Nūr Muḥammad of Sylhet, one of
the trusted khalīfas of Saiyyid Aḥmad Shahīd (martyred in 1831).22 His love for
the Prophet and his mystic engagements led him in 1867 to resign his job as the
political secretary of the Nawāb of Awadh living in exile in Calcutta.23 Ḥaẓrat
Wāʾisī’s shrine in Calcutta attracts a large number of devotees, including non-
Muslims, even today.24
Ḥaẓrat Bānu Zuhrā Khatūn was born in Calcutta where her father was serv-
ing the exiled Nawāb of Awadh.25 As the daughter of Ḥaẓrat Fatḥ ʿAlī Wāʾisī, she

18 Muḥammad Muṭiʿur Raḥmān. 1967. Āʿina-i Waisī. Patna: Labul Litho Press, p. 189.
19 Muhammad Ismail. 2010. Hagiology of Sufi Saints and the Spread of Islam in South Asia.
New Delhi: Jananada Prakashan, p. 139.
20 Ibid, p. 138.
21 His collection of verses in Persian language, titled Dīwān-i-Waiʾsī was first published in
1867 at Maṭbaʿ-i-Ghawsiya, Calcutta and ran into two reprints in 1898 and 1922 (Maṭbaʿ-
i-Qayyūmī, Kanpur).
22 Āʿina-i-Waisī, p. 149.
23 Ibid, pp. 152–53.
24 Among several biographies of Ḥaẓrat Fataḥ ῾Alī Wāisī written in Bengali as a devotional
tribute, Shan-i-Waisi is also translated into English. See Shan-i Waisi by Ahmadul Islam
Chowdhury, Kolkotta, Waisi Darbār Sharīf, 2007.
25 Shan-i Waisi, p. 59.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 333

grew up in a household where devotion for Allāh and love for the Prophet and
his Traditions were the guiding principles. Bānu Zuhrā Khatūn was well versed
in Arabic, Persian, and Urdu and could write in these three languages with
ease. Under the guidance of her father, she acquired knowledge of the Qurʾān,
its exegesis (tafsīr), and Ḥadīth.26 As a child, she received spiritual knowl-
edge and training from her father.27 Piety, asceticism, and love for humanity
became so deeply entrenched in her life that while still a young person, she
was acclaimed for her saintly virtues. Her devotees and followers address her
as Quṭbu’l Aqṭāb (head of the Aqṭāb) and Durr-i-Maknūn (the secret pearl). She
was one of the major spiritual successors (khalīfa) of her father.
Ḥaẓrat Bānu Zuhrā Khatūn was married to Saiyyid Muḥammad Ḥusain, who
belonged to the family of landowners of Shahpur. She left behind a son and two
daughters.28 Local traditions say that when the time of her death approached,
she told her son to leave the door of her room ajar and let no one enter. All
alone in the room, she kept reciting the Qurʾān and offering prayers for the
next eight days and then passed away.29 Her shrine in Shahpur, Murshidabad
(West Bengal, India), is a centre of great devotional activities and is visited by
a large number of her followers.

(3)
Ḥaẓrat Bībī Ṣāḥiba
Date: D. 12 Rabiʿu’l awwal 1218/3 July 1803
Place: Delhi/Peshawar
Shrine: Mazar Sharif, Afghanistan

Ḥaẓrat Bībī Ṣāḥiba, also known as Bībī Kalāṅ (the grand lady) and Bībī
Qayyūmi, is the only woman Sufi whose khilāfat nāma and ijāzat nama, con-
ferred upon her by her spiritual guide and mentor, Ḥaẓrat Ṣafīu’llah Qayyūm-i
Jahan, is on record. A copy of this document is included in ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt
(Assemblies of the Highest Ones), a collection of biographies of the Naqshbandī
Sufi Shaikhs, written in Persian by her son, Muḥammad Faẓlu’llah Naqshbandī
(1184/1771–1238/1822).30 Pīr Muḥammad Hāshim Mujaddidī of Tando Saindād,
Sindh, in his preface to ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, addresses her as Bībī Kalāṅ and

26 Ibid, p. 59.
27 Hagiology of Sufi Saints, p. 139.
28 Āʿina-i Wāʾisī, pp. 191–92.
29 Shān-i Waisi, p. 60.
30 Muḥammad Faẓlu’llah ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt (Lahore: Litho Expert Printing Press, 1355/
1936), pp. 249, 495–511.
334 Chapter 10

says that she was the highest deputy and noble successor (khalīfa-i ʿāzam wa
jā-nishīn-i akram) of Ḥaẓrat Qayyūm-i Jahan.31
The only source of information about the life of Ḥaẓrat Bībī Ṣāḥiba,
ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, however, neither identifies her by her personal name
nor gives the date of her birth.32 Bībī Ṣāḥiba belonged to an illustrious fam-
ily of scholars and Sufis. Her father, Shāh ʿAṭā’u’llāh Sirhindi Bukhārī, of the
Sādāt-i Bukhārī-Delhi ancestry, was a descendant of Shaikh ʿAbdul Wahāb bin
Yusuf bin ʿAbdul Wahāb Ḥusainī Bukhārī Uchchi whose lineage is traced to
Ḥaẓrat Makhdūm Jahāṅiyaṅ Jahāṅgasht (1308–1384). Shaikh ʿAbdul Wahāb
is counted among the well-acclaimed scholars (al-mʿārūfīn bil ʿilm)33 and is
known for instructing and guiding people of Delhi in the mystic path (ṣāḥib-i
irshād). He had friendly relations with Mujaddid-i Alf-i Sānī (d. 1624), who
wrote at least two letters to him in which, according to Khwāja Faẓlu’llah, the
Mujaddid addressed him with eulogistic terms ( fiqrāt-i madḥiyā).34 On her
maternal side, she was related to the descendants of Mujaddid-i Alf-i Sānī.
She was the maternal niece of Ḥaẓrat Ṣafīullah, Qayyūm-i Jahan (1746–1798).35
She was married to Ḥaẓrat Shāh Ghulām Nabī (d. 1226/1811),36 son of Ḥaẓrat
Shāh Ghulām Ḥasan (d. 1789),37 whose father, Ḥaẓrat Ghulām Muḥammad
(d. 1178/1765), was a direct descendant of Mujaddid-i Alf-i Sānī. From this

31 Umdatu’l Maqāmāt, p. b. For Pīr Muḥammad Hāshim Mujaddidī (1904–1975), see

Sāḥibzāda Abu’l-Khair Zubair. Sindh ke Sufiya-i Naqshband, vol. 2 (Lahore: Ẓiāʾu’l Qurʾān
Publications, 2007) pp. 152–60; also see Abu’l Afsār ʿAlī Muḥammad Balkhī. 1983. Tārīkh-i
Awliyāʾ al-maʿrūf bi ilhamāt-i ghaiybīya fi salāsil-i Saifīya‌ʾ. Peshawar: Nūrāni Kutbkhānā,
pp. 133–138.
32 Though Muḥammad Faẓlu’llah does not give Ḥaẓrat Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s date of birth, however,
based on his statement that she died exactly at the age of fifty-two (ʿumr-i mubarak īshān
ba panjah wa du sāl kāmil rasīda) on Friday, 12 Rabiʿu’l Awwal 1218/July 2, 1803, her year of
birth would be 1166 AH. See ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, p. 508.
33 Ḥaẓrat ʿAbdul Wahāb Bukhārī who arrived in Delhi during the last days of Emperor Akbar
and the early days of Emperor Jahangir held an administrative office in Delhi. He returned
to Delhi after Ḥajj in 1060/1680. See Nuzhat al-Khwāṭir, vol. 5, entry no. 434, p. 583.
34 ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, pp. 496–97. For letters, see Letter Nos. 56 and 57 in Maktūbāt Ḥaẓrat
Mujaddid-i Alf-i Sānī. (daftar awwal) Urdu translation by Saiyyid Zawwār Ḥusain (Karachi:
Idāra Mujaddidya, 1988), pp. 186–87.
35 Shāh Ṣafīullah Sirhindī founded the Mujjaddidī silsila in Afghānistan where he settled in
Kabul at the time of Timur Shāh (1772–1793) and was also there when Zamān Shāh came
into power in 1793. He died during his Hajj pilgrimage and was buried in Yemen. See,
ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, pp. 445–87.
36 For the life sketch of Ḥaẓrat Shāh Ghulām Nabī, see Umdatu’l Maqāmāt, pp. 438–41.
37 A large number of devotees, running into thousands, came each day to seek the blessings
Ḥaẓrat Shāh Ghulām Ḥasan whom Muḥammad Faẓlu’llah describes as pīr ʿārif-i kāmil
(perfect gnostic). Some of these disciples, because of the power of his ecstatic state (qadr-
i jazb), became unconscious, some even became mad (aksar murdum ḥalqā-i īshān bihosh
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 335

marriage, she had two sons, Muḥammad Faẓlu’llah (1184/1771–1238/1822), the

author of ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, and Ḥaẓrat Muḥammad Ẓiāʾu’l Ḥaqq (d. 1839),
and a daughter (d. 1800) whose name is not recorded. Ḥaẓrat Muḥammad
Faẓlu’llāh and Muḥammad Ẓiāʾu᾽l Ḥaqq (1839) were disciples and khalīfas of
Ḥaẓrat Ṣafīullah, Qayyūm-i Jahan.
After describing Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s ancestry (nasb-i zāhirī), the author moves to
narrate her spiritual connections (nisbat-i bāṭinī) and asks his readers to pay
attention to this account of the spiritual journey of Bībī Ṣāḥiba.38 At the age of
seven, on the twenty-ninth of Ramaẓan, while she was fasting, she took her oath
of allegiance (murīd shudam) at the hands of Ḥaẓrat Ṣafīu’llah. Describing that
spiritual experience to her son at a later date, the feeling of contentment which
never left her (lazzat āṅ ilā-alyaum az man na-raftā), she recalled that once
he finished giving instructions (talqīn) to his disciples, he turned his attention
(mutawajjih) towards her.39 Under his guidance, Bībī Ṣāḥiba covered the jour-
ney of years in no time (muʿāmilāt sanīn ra basāʿat ṭayi farmūdand) and soon
attained high stations and exalted ranks (maqāmāt-i ʿālī wa marātib-i mutaʿālī).
Once she absorbed the way of Muḥammad, and reached all the stages of mys-
ticism (bajamʿī madārīj-i wilāyat) and all the secrets (asrār) were revealed to
her, her murshid (spiritual teacher), Ḥaẓrat Qayyūm-i Jahan, ordered her to
take the responsibility of instructing others. Bībī Ṣāḥiba, however, remained
hesitant for some time until she was blessed with the vision (ba-sharf-i ziyārat)
of the Prophet in her dream. In her dream, the Prophet bestowed upon her
a special cloak (khilʿat khāṣṣa) of khilāfat and stressed the importance of
accepting khilāfat. She narrated her dream to her murshid who had long
waited for this and was overjoyed. He then wrote a letter of authorisation for
instructions (nāma-i ijāzat wa irshād) and as a token of blessings (tabarrukāt),
conferred upon her his own cloak and turban wrap ( jubā wa dastār-i khud).
Further, Ḥaẓrat Qayyūm-i Jahan ordered all his students who were present in
the assembly, most being males, to stand outside Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s cell (ḥujrā) for
instructions and attention. He also instructed his excellent spiritual deputies
(khulāfāʾ-yi kāmil), his sons, small children, and even his daughters and wives
to become Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s disciples. Bībī Ṣāḥiba, willingly but with some wor-
ries (ṭauʿan wa karhan), took up her responsibilities earnestly. Her influence
spread everywhere at an unbelievable pace. A large number of people, particu-
larly women, whether from the neighbourhood or distant places, approached

mīshudund wa bʿāẓ bajunūn mī rasīdund). His shrine exists in Peshawar. See ʿUmdatu’l
Maqāmāt, pp. 435–37.
38 Ibid, p. 499.
39 Umdatu’l Maqāmāt, p. 425.
336 Chapter 10

her to seek spiritual knowledge (mardam az dūr wa nazdīk, khusūsan az ʿālam

nisa‌ʾ ba-īshāṅ rujūʿ awardand). Many women left their homes and came to live
under her protection, where they were intoxicated (sarmast wa sarshār) by the
exposition of Light and with the subtleties of mysteries (asrār). Several of these
women seekers of Truth who became majzūbā (intoxicated Sufi) were seen
with chains tied around their legs (zanjīr bapā) at Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s place. Such a
unique sight of women congregating, as witnessed here, had never before been
seen anywhere in the women’s world. Indeed, such a manifestation of spiritual
gathering was rare even in men’s universe (dar ʿālam-i rajāl).40
Next, Ḥaẓrat Qayyūm-i Jahan conferred upon her the irshād nāma and
appointed her as one of his twenty-eight deputies.41 The document began by
invoking Allāh, the Prophet, friends of Allāh, and the virtuous ones. Next, Bībī
Ṣāḥiba was honoured and addressed as makhdūma (one who is waited upon),
muḥtarma (the venerable), muʿazzama (the respected one), mukarrāma (the
noble), mazhar anwāru’l Qayyūm (manifestation of the Eternal Light), nūru’l
ʿain wa samaratu’l fuʾād (light of eyes and the reward of heart) and ummatu’l
mʾāsūma (mother of the innocent). Ḥājī Ṣafīu’llah al-Sirhindi then states that
under his guidance, Bībī Ṣāḥiba learned with perfection (bā-itmām) the rules
and the way (sulūk wa tamlīk) of the Naqshbandī silsila and attained the high-
est stages of wilāyat, comprehending the secrets of tauḥīd-i-wajūdi and shahūdi
and the teachings of Ḥaẓrat Mujaddid-i Alf-i Sānī. Qayyūm-i Jahan also added
that since the Prophet had already bestowed khilāfat upon her, there was no
need for him to confer this letter of authorization. Concluding this letter of
investiture, Qayyūm-i Jahan observes that according to the noble traditions of
guidance and instruction of disciples, nothing ought to be done without the
permission of the Master (be izn-i pīr). He therefore declares in writing that
whoever, from among men or women, seeks the path of the Sublime God (ṭālib
rāh-i īzad mutaʿāl) and approaches her and follows her path, it is as if he or she
has sought his own guidance.42
An incredible hagiographical narrative describing Ḥaẓrat Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s
mystical experience (ilhām) says that once when Ḥaẓrat Rābiʿa passed by the
assembly of Bībī Ṣaḥiba, she wondered about Ḥaẓrat Rābiʿa attributes. The
moment this thought entered her mind, she found that Ḥaẓrat Rābiʿa’s quali-
ties were similar to those of some of her disciples. When Bībī Ṣāḥiba related this
to Ḥaẓrat Qayyūm-i Jahan, he told her that if Rābiʿa was there, she would have

40 The above narrative is based on translations from ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, pp. 499–500.
41 For the list of deputies, which also included Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s two sons, see Umdatu’l Maqāmāt,
pp. 490–95.
42 ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, pp. 500–501.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 337

served Bībī Ṣaḥiba (agar Rābiʿa darīn waqt mi būd khidmat-i- īshān ikhtiyār mi
farmūd).43 To celebrate this unique honour and in thanksgiving (bashukrāna),
Bībī Ṣaḥiba distributed food and money among the pious persons.44
Another incident also demonstrates the public recognition of Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s
status. In 1797 she, along with her two sons and a daughter who remains
anonymous, accompanied Qayyūm-i Jahan on his second Ḥajj pilgrimage
as the leader of the caravan (sar barāh-i qāfila).45 During this travel, from
Kabul via Qalat and Kohistan towards the coast of Karachi, devotees in large
number came to seek her blessings (barakāt suḥbat-i īshāṅ) and entered the
Naqshbandī ṭarīqa (dākhil ṭarīqa). Facing a severe typhoon close to Masqat, the
pilgrims disembarked there for a few days. The pilgrims reached al-Hudaydah
in Yemen via the Port of al-Mukhā (Mocha). In al-Hudaydah, Ḥaẓrat Qayyūm-i
Jahan passed away on 6 Ziqʿad 1212/22 April 1798 after a brief illness.46 After his
burial, the pilgrims’ caravan reached Makkah. Muḥammad Faẓlu’llah records
several incredible anecdotes that occurred during the ʿUmra performance of
Bībī Ṣāḥiba.
After performing the ʿUmra, Bībī Ṣāḥiba narrated that Ḥaẓrat Qayyūm-i
Jahan, prior to his demise, had conferred upon her the cloak (khilʿat) of
Qayyūmiyat along with several other favours (ʿināyāt) that he found hard to list
in the book. Quoting Bībī Ṣāḥiba, Faẓlu’llāh writes that whenever she focussed
spiritually (mutawajjih) during her pilgrimage, she would feel as if the four cor-
ners of the Kaʿba were around her and all the pious worshippers were prostrat-
ing in front of her (sijda ʿābidān ra ba sū-i khud miyāftam). When she would
approach the Black Stone, she would hear a voice calling her from inside the
Black Stone, “O’ ye the favourite exalted one” (ta ʿāllī yā maqbūla), “O’ ye the
exalted beloved” (taʿāllī yā maḥbūba), and “O’ ye Hindiya.” Miraculously, when
she was about to kiss the Black Stone, the whole space around it would be free
of pilgrims. On her arrival in Makkah, after the completion of the pilgrimage,
another incredible event occurred. A letter of acceptance (nama-i qabūl) of
Ḥajj, stating that that year the pilgrimage of all was accepted because of her,
was conferred upon her. She was blessed with the vision of the Prophet and of
the two caliphs. The Prophet blessed her with a green-coloured khilʿat and the

43 Ibid, p. 502.
44 Ibid, p. 502.
45 Ibid, p. b.
46 Ḥaẓrat Qayyūm-i Jahan perhaps passed away due to a severe tooth infection. He already
had broken his four front teeth in Kabul (ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, pp. 452, 474). For travel and
death of Ḥaẓrat Qayyūm-i Jahan, see ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, pp. 472–78.
338 Chapter 10

Caliphs bestowed upon her khilʿat-i paichīda.47 Further, Bībī Ṣāḥiba also nar-
rated another mystical experience of her ziyārat of Bībī Fāṭima, the Prophet’s
daughter, who affectionately kissed her forehead and welcomed her as a ven-
erable visitor (bātarīqa mehmān-i ʿazīz). From Madīna, travelling via Jidda and
Ṭāʾif, the pilgrims’ caravan returned to Ḥaram Sharīf with the intention of per-
forming a second Ḥajj. However, in the month of Ramaẓān, after being told in
a vision that her pilgrimage and that of her companions was already accepted,
she resumed her return journey.48
On her way back to her country, she stopped at al-Hudaydah and arranged
for the construction of Ḥaẓrat Qayyūm-i Jahan’s shrine. She arrived in Sindh
and stayed there for some time in the town of Mutʿalwi.49 Large numbers of
people (mardum bisyār) received her blessings and entered her ṭarīqa. Her
sixteen-year-old daughter passed away in the town of Mutʿalwi in 1214/1800.50
Bībī Ṣāḥiba constructed a mosque and her women devotees built a shrine
(qubbā) for her daughter within the mosque complex.51 This incident, while
documenting women’s spiritual activism, also indicates the possibility of fur-
ther research on pious Sindhi women’s roles.
From Matiari, Sindh, Bībī Ṣāḥiba travelled to Sirhind to visit the shrine of
the Mujaddid. Finally, the end of her earthly journeys approached and she
returned to Kabul, from where after a yearlong stay she went to Bukhara in
present-day Uzbekistan to visit the shrine of Ḥaẓrat Bahāʾu’d-Dīn Naqshband
(d. 791/1389). In Bukhara, Bībī Ṣāḥiba began to have a premonition that she was
to depart soon from this world and that her last resting place was destined to
be Bukhara. Thus, one day she related to her sons a conversation she had with
Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Bahāʾu’d-Dīn Naqshband in her dream in which the Khwāja
said that though her life was about to end soon, he had supplicated for an
extension of thirty years for her. To this, she submitted that as she loved death
(marā chunān muḥabbat-i wiṣāl uftāda), she would therefore request that half
of the gift, i.e., fifteen years, be given to one of her sons and the other fifteen
years to her other son. Her supplication was granted.52

47 Whereas paichīda means twisted, I could not find its extended usage for a category of
khilʿat.
48 ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, pp. 4–505.
49 Mutʿalwi is the present-day Matiari. See M.H. Panhwar, Chronological Dictionary of Sind
(Jamshoro: Institute of Sindhology, 1983), p. 340.
50 Muḥammad Faẓlu’llah writes that when his mother, Bībī Saḥiba was pregnant with her
daughter, his father, Ḥaẓrat Shāh Ghulām Nabī, had already predicted the birth of a
female child who would die in her youth. See ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, p. 439.
51 Ibid, p. 505.
52 Ibid, p. 506.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 339

On Friday, 12 Rabiʿu’l Awwal 1218/2 July 1803, she passed away at the age of
fifty-two years while doing zikr and after reciting passages from the Qurʾān.
When her body, wrapped in a shroud and soaked in the water of zamzam
that she had brought from Makka, was lowered into the grave, Muḥammad
Faẓluʿllāh lifted the shroud to view her face. When he did this, she opened her
eyes and with a smile looked affectionately at her two sons (nigāh-i mihr ālūda
andākhta zahk).53 When one of her sons, Shāh Ẓiāʾul Ḥaqq, said that she must
be alive, a man standing nearby commented that “awliyāʾ performs such mir-
acles even after death” (az awliyāʾ-i azīn nauʿ khawāriq bisyār baʿd marg wuqūʿ
yāfta). Recalling this comment, Faẓlu’llāh remembered that a similar miracle
was experienced at the time of the burial of Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Muḥammad Parsā
(d. 822/1420) by his son Khawāja Burhānu’d-Dīn Abu Naṣr.54 Bībī Ṣāḥiba was
buried within the shrine complex of Imām ʿAlī (rawāq-i az qubba sānī) at
Mazār-i-Sharif.55
Curiously, throughout the book Bībī Ṣāḥiba is not mentioned by name and
is addressed only by an honorific title used for addressing a woman of respect
and high position. Thus, most women, irrespective of their status within power
hierarchies, remained veiled. Far more surprising than Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s anonym-
ity is the closing observation of her son and the scribe of her glorious deeds.
Concluding the narrative of women coming in unprecedented numbers to
benefit from Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s instructions, Muḥammad Faẓlu’llah could not, how-
ever, rise above the deep-seated misogyny and wonders how women, who as a
class ( jamaʿa) are known for being deficient in intellect and faith (bānuqṣ ʿaql
wa dīn muttaṣif and), acquired excellence in gnostic and certitude (ʿirfān wa
yaqīn).
Sufi biographical compendiums and even accounts of Mujaddidī silsila
have not acknowledged the status of Ḥaẓrat Bībī Ṣāḥiba. Surprisingly, Buehler,
in his study of the Indian Naqshbandīyya Sufis, though he had access to
ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt and also noticed the name of Bībī Ṣāḥiba, left the topic
largely unexplored except for mentioning her name once in the preface of his
work.56 Despite these omissions, Bībī Ṣāḥiba’s rare example of spiritual activ-
ism remains unmatched.

53 Ibid, pp. 507–8.

54 ʿAbdur Raḥman Jami in Nafaḥāt al-uns narrates that when laid in his grave, Khwāja
Muḥammad Parsā, a disciple and khalīfa of Ḥaẓrat Bahāʾud Dīn Naqshband, opened his
eyes and looked smilingly at his son. See ʿAbdur Raḥman Jāmī, and William Nassau Lees.
1858. The Nafahtal-ons min hadharát alqods, or The lives of the Soofis. Calcutta: Matbaʿ
Leesi, p. 452.
55 ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt, p. 508.
56 Arthur Buehler. 1998. Sufi Heirs of the Prophet: The Indian Naqshbandiyya and the Rise of
the Meditating Sufi Shaykh. University of South Carolina Press, p. xxiv.
340 Chapter 10

(4)
Ḥaẓrat Bībī Daulat
Period: Late Sixteenth–Early Seventeenth Century
Place: Delhi, India

Ḥaẓrat Bībī Daulat is one of the several women permitted to teach and instruct
women in the Naqshbandī ṭarīqa. Bībī Daulat’s journey from being an ordi-
nary housewife to attaining the most sought-after status in the hierarchy of
Sufi organizations began in an extraordinary way. Bībī Daulat’s narrative is
found only in Hāshim Kishmī’s (d. 1643) Zubdat al-muqāmāt (the essence of
mystical station), an important source on the lives of the Naqshbandī Sufis
based on the author’s personal information and what he had learned from his
Naqshbandī friends.57 Shaikh Tāju’d-Dīn Sambhalī (d. 1051/1641),58 the clos-
est and most trusted disciple of Khwāja Bāqī Billah (971/1563–1012/1603),59
related Bībī Daulat’s story to Kishmī.60 It is said that subsequent to Khwāja
Bāqī Billah’s giving his permission to Shaikh Tāju’d-Dīn to instruct others about
the Naqshbandī ṭarīqa, strange transformations occurred in the nafs (the inner
self) and nazr (gaze) of Shaikh Tāju’d-Dīn. His one glance was, thus, enough to
cause anyone who sought his attention to fall into mystical rapture (ghalaba),
experiencing the highest state of mystical ecstasy (aḥwāl).
Once while on his way to his hometown of Sambhal (now in UP, India),
Shaikh Tāju’d-Dīn stopped for an overnight stay at the house of his friend Shaikh
Allāh. Shaikh Allāh, with his wife, Bībī Daulat, lived somewhere in Firuzabad
at the edge of Delhi. Shaikh Allāh was also a disciple of Khwāja Bāqī Billah.
Shaikh Allāh’s wife, Bībī Daulat, a righteous woman, already had an intense
desire for spirituality and expressed a desire to learn from Shaikh Tāju’d-Dīn
about the zikr practice of the Naqshbandīs. Shaikh Tāju’d-Dīn agreed. That
night Bībī Daulat went through strange mystical experiences that revealed to

57 Iqbal Sabir. “A critical study of Zubdat-ul-Maqāmāt.” Dissertation submitted for the

Degree of Master of Philosophy, Centre of Advanced Study, Department of History,
Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, 1985.
58 For his short biography, see Badru’d-Dīn Sirhindī ibn Muḥammad Ibrāhīm. Ḥaẓarāt’l quds
mukammal [Urdu translation by Hafiz Muḥammad Ashraf, (Lahore: Maktab Hanifia,
2016)] pp. 316–21; Nuzhat al-khawāṭir, vol. 5, pp. 507–8; Nasim Ahmad Faridi Amrohwi.
Tazkira Khwāja Bāqī Billah maʿ ṣāḥibzadagān wa khulafāʾ. (Lucknow: Kutubkhānā
al-Furqān, 1978), pp. 86–98.
59 Some short-lived dissensions, however, took place between the two over Shaikh Tāju᾽d-
Dīn’s treatment of other Sufis, particularly of a majzūb. See A.A. Rizvi, A History of Sufism
in India, vol. 2, pp. 336–38.
60 Khwāja Muḥammad Hāshim Kishmī. 1890. Zubdat al-muqāmāt. (Kanpur: Maṭbaʿ Munshī
Nawal Kishore, 1980. All references here are from the Urdu translation by Ghulām Mustafa
Khan and Maulānā Abul Fath Saghiruddin. Maṭbaʿ Nuʿmānia, Sialkot, 1407/1987), pp. 111–2.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 341

her the secrets of the soul and of the spiritual world (kashf-i malākī wa arwāh).
Later, she narrated her experience to her husband so that he could tell Shaikh
Tāju’d-Dīn about it. As soon as the husband heard his wife’s story of mysti-
cal experiences, he began behaving as if some supernatural powers possessed
him. Shaikh Allāh had earlier requested Khwāja Bāqī Billah through Shaikh
Tāju’d-Dīn for his spiritual attention and favours (tawajjuh aur ʿināyat). He
went to Shaikh Tāju’d-Dīn and enquired about his request. On his insistence,
Tāju’d-Dīn reluctantly said that the Khwāja’s response was that there was little
chance for this person (Shaikh Allāh) to gain anything from him. Hearing this,
Shaikh Allāh became agitated, tearing his clothes and pulling his hair, and ran
towards the abode of Khwāja Bāqī Billah. The moment he was in the presence
of the Khwāja and glanced at his forehead, he became overpowered by an
unknown force and fell unconscious. Instructing someone to look after Shaikh
Allāh, Khwāja Bāqī Billah went to the house of Shaikh Allāh to enquire after
Bībī Daulat’s condition. He brought her with him to Delhi, arranged for her
stay in his neighbourhood, and began visiting her daily. With the blessings of
his constant attention (tawajjuh), Bībī Daulat attained higher stages (darajāt).
Soon permission to teach (ijāzat nama tʿālīm) her disciples was bestowed upon
her. At the time of writing Zubdat al-muqāmāt (1627–1628), Bībī Daulat was
instructing the Naqshbandī ṭarīqa of zikr in the Qilaʿ Sulṭān Firūz (Kotla Firūz
Shāh Tughlaq) to a large number of women, many of whom benefitted from her
instructions. She excelled in teaching them how to attain zikr, jazba, and ḥuzūr
(remembrance, Divine attraction, and awareness of Allāh’s presence)—these
three being the essential teachings for the seeker of the spiritual path (sulūk)
of the Naqshbandī ṭarīqa. Kishmī, in closing the narrative of Bībī Daulat, writes
that her daughter was married to Khwāja Ḥusāmu’d-Dīn Aḥmad (d. 1043/1633),
one of the disciples of Khwāja Bāqī Billah.61

(5)
Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl
Period: Thirteenth Century
Place: Ajmer, India
ʿUrs: 19 Rajabu’l Murajjab

Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl’s life presents some highly significant aspects of early medi-
eval Muslim society in Hindustan. She was the daughter of the Sijistan-born

61 Zubdat al-muqāmāt, pp. 113–115; also see Ḥayāt-i Bāqiya. Compiled & translated in Urdu
by Ḥāfiz Muḥammad Raḥīm Bakhsh Dihlawī. Dihlī: Afẓal al-maṭāb῾, 1905, p. 92. For the
biography of Khwāja Hisāmu’d-Dīn Aḥmad, see Ibid, pp. 122–134. Khwāja Hisāmu’d-Dīn
Aḥmad had earlier married a sister of Abu’l Faẓl, the author of Akbarnama.
342 Chapter 10

wandering Sufi, Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī Ajmeri (d. 633/1236), who finally
settled down in the region of Ana Sagar Lake in Ajmer, Rajasthan, around the
end of the twelfth century.62 The Khwāja had two wives and at least three male
children but only one daughter, Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl, whose mother, Bībī Ummat
Allāh, was the daughter of a Hindu chieftain, probably of Rajput ancestry.63
Manāqibu’l Maḥbūbīn, a late nineteenth-century Persian hagiography of
Chishtī Sufis, without citing any source, says that Bībī Ummat Allāh was cap-
tured during war and was a bondmaid (kanīz) of Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī
who kept her as malk-i yamīn (war booty).64
Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl was married to Shaikh Raẓiu’d-Dīn alias ʿAbdullah, son of
Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī (d. 1274), the closest disciple and khalīfa of her father.65
ʿAlī Aṣghar Chishtī in Jawāhir-i Farīdī (1623) says that she had no children
with this marriage but they all died in infancy.66 Most other sources, includ-
ing Mūnisu’l arwāh (1638), the passionate hagiographical account of Khwāja
Ajmeri by Jahān Ārāʾ Begam, the daughter of Shāh Jahan, the Mughal Emperor,
also say that two sons were born of this marriage but died in infancy.67
With mixed parental ancestry, Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl’s life exemplifies the histori-
cal process of the growth of Muslim community. More importantly, she is the
first woman, known thus far, to don the khirqa-i khilāfat (cloak of khilāfat) of
the Chishtī silsila of the Sufis, which was conferred upon her on 11 Rabiʿu’l ākhir
599 after ʿisha‌ʾ prayers by her father, Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī Ajmeri,
popularly known as Khwāja Gharīb Nawāz.68 The authors of Jawāhir-i Farīdī,

62 For short biographical sketch of Khwāja Muʿīnu᾽d-Dīn Chishtī, see SA, pp. 4–18; Jawāhir-i
Farīdī yāʿnī Tazkira-i Farīdī by ʿAlī Aṣghar Chishtī (Urdu translation by Fazlu’d-Dīn
Naqshbandi Mujaddidī). Pakpattan: Maktabā Bābā Farīd (n. d.), pp. 220–234.
63 Jahān Ārāʾ Begam, Mūnisu’l-arwāḥ. 1638. Translated in Urdu as Muʿīnu’l-arwāḥ by
Maulawī Muḥammad ʿAbdus Ṣamad Kalīm Qādirī. Dehli: Matbāʿ Rizvi, (1891), p. 25; ʿAlī
Aṣghar Chishtī in Jawāhir-i Farīdī says that she was the daughter of a chieftain p. 162.
Ilah Diyā Chishtī in Risālā Siyaru’l Aqṭāb (translated in Urdu by Muḥammad ʿAlī Joyā.
Kanpur: Nawal Kishore, 1906) also writes that she was the daughter of a Raja of Deccan,
p. 126; Munshi Babū Lāl. 1881. Waqāiʿ Shāh Muʿīnu᾽d-Dīn Chishtī. Kanpur: Nawal Kishore,
p. 54; ʿAbdu’l Razzāq ῾Atāʾ Ḥusain. 1302/1884. Kanzu’l ansāb. Bombay: Maṭba῾ Ṣafdarī,
p. 74; Muḥammad ʿAbduʿl Ahad. 1319/1901. Panch Ganj-Malfūzāt Khwājgān-i-Chisht ahl-i-
bihisht. Dehli: Matbaʿ Mujtabāi᾽, p. 9.
64 Najmu᾽d-Dīn Sulaimānī. Manāqibu᾽l Maḥbūbīn (Urdu translation by Iftikhar Aḥmad
Chishtī). Faisalabad: Chishtīyya Academy, 1987. (First published in 1278/1861, Maṭbaʿ
Muḥammadi Lahore) p. 83; No other source supports this claim.
65 Mūnisu’l-arwāḥ, p. 25.
66 Jawāhir-i Farīdī, p. 162.
67 Mūnisu’l-arwāḥ. p. 25; also, see Risālā Siyaru᾽l Aqṭāb, p. 127.
68 Jawāhir-i Farīdī, p. 162; Khwāja Ḥasan Nizāmī. 1930. Tārīkh Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī
Ajmerī. Delhi: Afẓal Book Depot, p. 80.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 343

a hagiographical tazkira completed in 1623, and of Tārīkh Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn

Chishtī Ajmerī, written in 1930, extolling the virtues of Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl, fur-
ther write that, subsequently, Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl instructed thousands of women
and helped them attain a station close to spirituality (martabā qarīb). Shaikh
Illah Diyā, a Sufi of the time of Emperor Aurangzeb, in his Risāla Siyaru’l Aqṭāb
(1646), referring to the charisma (karāmat) of Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl, confirms that
Khwāja Ajmeri conferred upon her khirqa-i khilāfat. In the list of at least eigh-
teen khalīfas of Khwāja Ajmeri, with illustrious and pious Sufis such as Khwāja
Quṭbu’d-Dīn Kākī and Shaikh Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī, Shaikh Illah Diyā has
included the name of one woman, Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl. Her devotion to Allāh was
unbounded. Thousands of women were blessed by Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl’s teachings
and attained high station (maqām) because of her tawajjuh.69
A modern author, Abul Fazal Ezzati, acknowledging Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl’s spiri-
tual accomplishments as the “best examples of a virtuous woman,” writes that
“Bibi Hafiz Jamal is one of the very few examples of a female pir in the history
of Sufism. Normally, a woman can only be a murid, not a murshid, but Bibi
Hafiz was allowed to have a murid, who took the baih to her in the manner
normally for men.”70
Known for her piety and ascetic life, Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl had learned the Qurʾān
by heart at the age of seven.71 She lies buried in Ajmer within the premises
of the dargāh of her father. Emperor Jahangir improved the tomb structure
and added silver-plated doors. The tomb enclosure, called the Begam Dālān or
“Women’s arcade,” is in the premises of the main mazār.72 Princess Jahan Ara
in 1637 built the Begam Dālān. In the area around the tomb of Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl,
lying to the west of Taragah fortress, is the spring Chashma-yi Ḥāfiz Jamāl.
Several Mughal princesses are also buried there.73 Her ʿurs is celebrated on
the nineteenth of Rajab and is also known as Nāl kā melā or as Melā of Bībī
Ḥāfiz Jamāl.74

69 Risālā Siyaru’l Aqṭāb, p. 127.

70 Ezzatī, Abū al-Faẓl. 2002. The spread of Islam: the contributing factors. London: Islamic
College for Advanced Studies, p. 216.
71 Waḥīd Aḥmad Masʿūd. Sawaniḥ Khwāja Muʿīnu’d-Dīn Chishtī. Karachi: Salman Academy,
Karachi: Salman Academy (n. d.), p. 170.
72 Tirmizi, S.A.I. 1968. Ajmer through inscriptions [1532–1852 AD New Delhi: Indian Institute
of Islamic Studies, p. 16. Maḥmūd, Sanāullāh. 2006. Sāu baṛī zāḥid khwātīn aūr un kī
sardār Ḥaẓrat Fāṭima bint-i Muḥammad: Ummhātu-lmu’minīn, banāt-i Rāsul, Ṣaḥābīyāt.
Lahore: Baitul‘ulūm, pp. 471–73.
73 Rushbrook Williams. 1965. A Handbook for Travellers in India, Pakistan, Burma and Ceylon.
London: John Murray, p. 178.
74 Troll records the date as 18 of Rajab, see C.W. Troll. 1982. Islam in India, vol. 1. Delhi:
Vikas, p. 70.
344 Chapter 10

(6)
Bībī Islām Khāno
Period: Sixteenth Century
Place: Shahābād, Karnal, India

Similar to most other women mystics, Bībī Islām Khāno’s life story is sparse in
the Sufi texts. She was a disciple and khalīfa of Ḥaẓrat ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī
(d. 456/1537) of the Ṣabrī-Chishtī Sufi silsila.75
Laṭāʾif-i Quddūsī, malfūz of Ḥaẓrat ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī by his son
Shaikh Ruknu’d-Dīn (d. 1575–1576), tells that Bībī Islām Khāno belonged to the
most politically active Sarwānī clan of the Afghāns of early sixteenth-century
Hindustan. ʿUmar Khan Sarwānī, son of Sikandar Khan Sarwānī76 and father
of Bībī Islām Khāno, who held the jāgīr of Shahābād (Ambala District) near
Karnal, first came in contact with Ḥaẓrat ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī in Radauli,
the hometown of the Shaikh, during the closing years of Sulṭān Bahlul Lodi
(r. 1451–1489) and became his disciple.77 Around 897/1492, during the time of
Sultan Sikandar Lodi (r. 1489–1517), due to some unpleasant events in Radauli,
Ḥaẓrat ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī along with his family moved to Shahābād
where he lived until 934/1528. Most probably, it was during his long stay of
more than three decades in Shahābād that ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī enrolled
Bībī Islām Khāno and her other family members as his disciples.78

75 Laṭāʾif-i Quddūsī, a collection of letters of ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī that his second son
and first deputy, Shaikh Ruknu’d-Dīn started compiling before his father’s death, provides
foundational material for the life of ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī. See Shaikh Ruknu’d-Dīn.
1311/1894. Laṭāʾif-i Quddūsī (Ḥālāt Ḥaẓrat ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī) Dehli: Matbaʿ Mujtabāʾī.
For a short biography of Gangohī, which discusses his spiritual excellence and discusses
the role of his son, see Khwāja Muḥammad Hāshim Kishmī, Zubdat al-muqāmāt. Kanpur:
Maṭbaʿ Munshī Nawal Kishore, 1980 (Urdu translation by Ghulām Muṣṭafa Khan and
Maulānā Abul Fath Ṣaghīru’ddīn. Matba‘ Nuʿmānia, Sialkot, 1407/1987), pp. 148–57. Also,
AA pp. 213–15; ʿAbduʾr Raḥmān Chishtī, Mirātu’l asrār [Urdu translation by Wāḥid Bakhsh
Siyāl, (Lahore: Ziau’l Qurʾān Publications, 1993)], p. 1186–1190; for a comprehensive biogra-
phy, see ʿIjāzu’l Ḥaqq Quddūsi. 1961. Ḥaẓrat ʿAbdu’l Ḥaqq-Quddūs Gangohī ḥayat aur unkī
tʿālīmāt. Karachi: Educational Press. Drawing mostly on ʿIjāzu’l Ḥaqq Quddūsi’s work is
Simon Digby’s 1975. ‘ʿAbd al-Quddus Gangohi (1456–1537): The personality and attitude of
a medieval Indian Sufi,’ in Khaliq Ahmad Nizami (Edited), Medieval India: a miscellany.
(pp. 1–66). (London: Asia Publishing House, 1975).
76 For more details about the Sarwānīs, Sikandar Khan and his sons, see Ḥājī ʿAbbās Khan
Sarwānī, Sarwānī-nāma (pp. 29–46) (Aligarh: Aligarh Sharwani Printing Press 1953).
ʿUmar Khan Sarwāni, wazir of Sultan Bahlol Lodi, played a crucial role in the accession of
Sikandar Lodi.
77 Laṭīfā no. 35, vide Laṭāʾif-i Quddūsī, pp. 30–31.
78 Haibat Khan, her brother and Saʿīd Khan, ῾Umar Khan’s son who first became Gangohī’s
disciples but later earned his displeasure. See Laṭīfā no. 52, vide Laṭāʾif-i Quddūsī, p. 52.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 345

Laṭīfā no. 57 in Laṭāʾif-i Quddūsī reveals significant details about the spiritual
status of Bībī Islām Khāno. It says that Bībī Islām Khāno, daughter of ʿUmar
Khan Sarwānī, was a disciple (murīd) of Ḥaẓrat Quṭbī, as ʿAbdu’l Quddūs
Gangohī was addressed by his sons and disciples. Bībī Islām Khāno remained
engaged in internal spiritual exercises (shughl-i bāṭin) and went through great
afflictions and hard work in following this path. As a result, zikr-i bāṭin (hidden
or silent remembrance of Allāh) overcame her. She used to say that the sound
of the word Allāh came from all of her body parts ( jamʿī aʿẓa‌ʾ). As the sound
came from her feet, too, out of respect, she did not put her feet down on the
ground. Bībī Islām Khāno’s devotion was so strong that she was convinced that
the wrath of Sultan Sikandar Lodi, which fell upon her brothers and led to their
exile to Gujarat, was because of the animosity they had for her Shaikh.79
These high esoteric qualities of Bībī Islām Khāno, however, were not suf-
ficient to weaken the power of traditions that reigned supreme in South Asia
and controlled all aspects of Muslims society there, including denying women
their rightful status. Thus, when Bībī Islām Khāno requested that ʿAbdu’l
Quddūs Gangohī permit her to enroll disciples and to bestow upon her the
cloak of the Sufis, it was denied.
To propagate his views, Gangohī corresponded regularly and addressed
about two hundred letters to rulers, elites, disciples, and relatives on a vari-
ety of themes, most dealing with Allāh’s worship and following the Tradition.
Among these letters, number sixty-six is the only one addressed to Bībī Islām
Khātūn or Khāno, on the crucial theme dar bayān ʿadam jawāz khilāfat bara‌ʾ
ye zanān har chih bākamāl mardāṅ rasad (an explanation of nonexistence of
justification for women’s khilafat, albeit they might have reached excellence of
men). This letter, similar to almost all the letters of ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī,
instead of beginning with the traditional form of salutation, opens by thrice
repeating the word Ḥaqq, one of the ninety-nine attributes of Allāh and which
literally means “the truth.” Gangohī addresses Bībī Islām Khātūn as “my sis-
ter” (khwāharam) and adds several eulogizing terms for her, such as ʿafīfā (the
chaste one), sājida (one who prostrates), and fakhru᾽n-nisāʾ fil ʿālamīn (pride of
women worldwide). Below are translated excerpts of this letter.

Undoubtedly this world is the bridge to afterlife. The purpose of worldly

life is to seek the Truth (ṭalab-i ḥaqq). Therefore, one should be con-
cerned about the afterlife and considering oneself a traveller, should lead
the life totally in submission (ʿibādat), remembrance of Allāh, manifestly
and internally (zikr-i zāhir wa bāṭin), and in leading life in seeking Allāh

79 Laṭīfā no. 57, vide Laṭāʾif-i Quddūsī, p. 41.

346 Chapter 10

with pleasure and interest. Remembrance of Allāh’s essence (ism-i zāt)

and attributes (asmā᾽ wa ṣifāt), along with the inner visualisation of the
Shaikh’s image (tasawwur-i shaikh) must be done so intensely that the
heart is completely engrossed (mustaghriq) and nothing but Allah only
remains in it.
As you have stepped courageously in the midst of men of Allāh
(miyān-i mardān-i ḥaqq taʿalā), therefore it behoves that you should con-
tinue the chain of instruction. If a woman attains excellence similar to
that of men, and steps into the world of men of Allāh, she deserves praise.
The patched frock of the Sufis (khirqa-i mashāʾiq), however, is not sent to
you because khilāfat is not lawful (mujāz gardānīdā nāshud) for women,
and the authority to make baiʿat also is not conferred (because of this).
However, if a truthful (ṣādiq) man or woman requests to seek spiritual
discipleship, you are, then, permitted to confer the hat (kulāh) and the
frock (dāman) on behalf of your Shaikh (bā wikālat pīr-i khud). For this,
woman should be present or absent, but for men only in absentia (ghai-
bat). Also, give them the spiritual genealogical table of your Shaikh in
the written form, and enrol them as the disciples (murīd) of your Shaikh.
Consider this fortune as the highest fortune. Afterlife be praised (ākhirat
maḥmūd bād).80

Of the two sources of this letter, the first one, Majmūaʿ khuṭūṭ, has included
the letter without any comments or observations about its content or purpose.
The second source, Fatāwā-i-Rashīdiya, links it with the continuous problem-
atic issue of women’s status in the Sufi hierarchy and Rashīd Aḥmad Gangohī
(1829–1905) uses it as a source for his fatwā. The fatwā is made in response to a
query regarding the appropriateness of pious women who follow the Sharīʿat
and are well versed with the rules of taṣawwuf, and initiate oaths of allegiance
to women and men. Rashīd Aḥmad Gangohī, a descendant of ʿAbdu’l Quddūs
Gangohī and a prolific fatwā giver, in support of his fatwā declaring women’s
baiʿat improper, quoted excerpts from ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī’s letter. It is sig-
nificant to note here that Rashīd Aḥmad Gangohī not only refers to ʿAbdu’l
Quddūs Gangohī but also adds that, according to the masters of mysticism and

80 Translation from the Urdu text of his letters, Majmūaʿ khuṭūṭ- Maktūbāt Quddūsia Quṭb-i
ʿĀlam Ḥaẓrat Shaikh ʿAbdul Quddūs Gangohī. Compiled and translated by Wāḥid Bakhsh
Siyāl, Lahore: al-Faisal,2010, pp. 229–30. The same letter, with little variation, is translated
in Urdu in Maulānā Rashīd Aḥmad Gangohī’s Fatāwā-i-Rashīdiya (Kamīl) Fiqh Ḥanafī kā
Anmol Khazīna. Karachi: Dāru᾽l Ishā῾at, n. d., p. 72. In my translation, I have used both
these sources.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 347

scholars of Islamic law (ahl-i taṣawwuf wa Sharīʿat), [implementing)] baiʿat by

women is not proper.81
ʿIjāzu’l Ḥaqq Quddūsi, a recent biographer of ʿAbdu’l Quddūs Gangohī,
has included her name in the list of his twenty-three deputies and prominent
disciples.82

(7)
Ḥaẓrat Mardum Maḥall
Date: D. 10 Muḥarram 1216/23 May 1801
Place: Chitli Qabar, Delhi, Pakistan

Addressed affectionately by her husband, Mirzā Mazhar Jan-i-Janāṅ (d. 1781),

eighteenth-century Naqshbandī-Mujaddidī Sufi, as Mardum Maḥall83 and
by his disciples and khalīfas as Ḥaẓrat Bībī Ṣāḥiba, her real name was Bībī
Ḥayātuʾn-nisāʾ.84 Details about her natal family and her life before marriage
remain little known. Her marriage was solemnised with Mirzā Mazhar in his
old age, as Khaliq Anjum infers from a letter by Mirzā Mazhar addressed to
Maulawī Naʿīmu’llah Bahrāʾīchī, his disciple and successor.85 A biographer
of Qāzī Sanāʾu’llah Pānīpatī (d. 1225/1810), a Sufi scholar and a disciple and
khalīfa of Mirzā Mazhar, gives the date of marriage as 1761, around the time
of the third battle of Panipat. The author also suggests that probably it was
Mardum Maḥall’s second marriage.86 The couple had no children; an adopted
son, named Pīr ʿAlī, a relative of Mardum Maḥall (qarābat-i Ḥaẓrat Bībī Ṣāḥiba)
lived with them.87
Mardum Maḥall’s name appears frequently in her husband’s letters addressed
to his disciples. A coherent narrative drawn from these letters and texts and
written by Mirzā Mazhar’s two disciples (who were also his khalīfas) Maulawī

81 Fatāwā-yi-Rashīdiyya (Kāmīl) Fiqh Ḥanafī kā Anmol Khazīna, p. 72.

82 Ḥaẓrat ʿAbdu’l Ḥaqq-Quddūs Gangohī ḥayat aur unkī tʿālīmāt, pp. 534–535.
83 The word mardum means a mermaid or the pupil of the eye.
84 Muḥammad Hasan Naqshbandī. 1904. Ḥālāt mashāikh-i Naqshbandiya Mujaddidīya.
Muradabad: Maṭba‌ʾ al-Maṭāba Aḥsan, p. 401. Zafar Aḥsan Bahrāʾīchī. 2015. Āsār Ḥaẓrat
Mirzā Mazhar Jan-i-Janāṅ. Bahrāʾīch: Khānqāh Naʿīmia, p. 179, f. n. no.9.
85 Khalīq Anjum (Edited and compiled). 1997. Maktūbāt-i Mirzā Mazhar Jān-i-Jānāṅ̇ shahīd:
ma‘ Sawaniḥ ʿumrī. Lahore: Makkī Dārulkutub. p. 35; for the life of Maulawī Naʿīmu’llah
Bahrāʾīchi, see. Āsār Ḥaẓrat Mirzā Mazhar Jan-i-Janāṅ, pp. 257–338.
86 Maḥmudu᾽l Ḥasan ʿᾹrif. 1995. Tazkira Qāzī Muḥammad Sanāʾu’llah Pānīpatī. Lahore:
Idāra Saqāfat-i Islāmyya, p. 227.
87 Fozail Ahmad Qadri. 1981. ‘Edition of Bisharat-i-Mazhariyah.’ Dissertation submitted for
the Degree of Master of Philosophy, Centre of Advanced Study, Department of History,
Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, p. 511. (The thesis consists of the original Farsi text).
348 Chapter 10

Naʿīmu’llah Bahrāʾīchī (d. 1218/1804) and Shāh Ghulām ʿAlī (d. 1240/1824),
helps to create a life account of Mardum Maḥall. These two valuable sources,
Bishārat-i-Mazhariyya (written in 1204–1207/1792–1795) and Maqāmāt-i
Mazharī (probably written in 1796), refer to the daily personal interaction of
the two authors with Mirzā Mazhar and his wife. In Bishārat-i- Mazhariyya,
Bahrāʾīchī sets a separate section under the subheading dar zikr aḥwāl ʿiffat
wā kamālāt wā dast-gāh maḥram-i muḥtaram ahl-i bait āṅ Ḥaẓrat (a narration
regarding the excellence and virtues of the venerable wife of the Ḥaẓrat).88
This narrative begins by saying that Mardum Maḥall was one from among
the rest of pious and excellent women of the world (īshāṅ az jumla ʿārifāt wā
kāmilāt nisaʿ-yi ʿālam and). She was authorised by the Master of the silsila
[Mirzā Mazhar] to instruct women. During the early days of her mystical state
of authorisation [to instruct], the effect and fervour of her spiritual concen-
tration [on her pupils] (tāsīr wā garmī dar tawajjuh) was abundant (bisyār mī
dāshtand). Mirzā Mazhar is quoted to have said that during the early stages of
her state of authorization (dar ibtidāʾ ḥāl ijāzat), as her inward self (dar bāṭin īṅ
mastūra) could create a high degree of impact, most women would often expe-
rience the highest form of ecstasy and would lose consciousness. However,
as her spiritual connection (nisbat) became weak because of carelessness
(bīparwāʾī) and lack of control (bī īhtimāmī) and fits of mental disorder (ʿāriẓā
saudā), she could no longer endure the intensity of spiritual instruction; oth-
erwise, the whole world would have benefitted by her virtues. Mirzā Mazhar
acknowledging the inner qualities of Mardum Maḥall, further observed that
“thanks to God, despite her indisposition, the essence of her spiritual con-
nection with this faqīr [Mirzā Mazhar], her strong love for the Sufi masters
remained intact.”89 In a letter addressed to Qāẓī Sanāʾu’llah Pānīpatī, Mirzā
Mazhar said that Mardum Maḥall had arranged for two sessions for women’s
instructions (tawajjuh) at her home. Instructions to women, Mirzā Mazhar
commented further, also had a positive effect on Mardum Maḥall as her men-
tal status improved and she severed her worldly connections further.90
Shāh Ghulām ʿAlī, in his Maqāmāt-i Mazharī, confirms the above narra-
tive. Paying respect to Mardum Maḥall, Shāh Ghulām ʿAlī describes her as the
refuge of purity (ʿiffat panāh) and power of chastity (ʿiṣmat dast-gāh), further
adding that she had learned to offer instruction to others under the super-
vision of Mirzā Mazhar. She attained the martaba (rank) of ḥuzūr wā āgāhī

88 Ibid, pp. 504–8.

89 Ibid, p. 504.
90 Khalīq Anjum (Edited & compiled). 1997. Letter no. 81 in Maktūbāt-i Mirzā Mazhar
Jān-i-Jānāṅ̇ shahīd: ma‘ sawāniḥ ʿumrī. Lahore: Makkī Dārulkutub, p. 247.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 349

(presence of Allāh and His awareness) because of his exalted companionship

(ṣuḥbat mubārak) and was given the ijāzat irshād nisāʾ-i ṣāliḥa (permission to
instruct virtuous women). Ghulām ʿAlī’s statement that Mardum Maḥall once
was blessed with the vision of the Prophet offers another evidence of her spiri-
tual status. She dreamt that the Prophet had bestowed great favour (ʿināyat-i
balīgha) on Mirzā Mazhar. This episode reflects upon the highest status of
Mardum Maḥall as it is held that the honour of Prophet’s vision in a dream
is a rare gift for the chosen ones only. It was because of these highest spiritual
attainments that Mirzā Mazhar asked his disciples to forgive Mardum Maḥall’s
mental illness as, in his words, an insane person deserves to be excused (dīwāna
maʿzūr ast).91
Mirzā Mazhar, in several of his letters, refers to the mental disorder of his
wife, and says that though this illness had made his life miserable, he had no
grudge against her.92 Indeed, he asked his disciples to treat Mardum Maḥall
with respect and to take care of her even after his death. In a will that he left
with Maulawī Sanāʾu’llah, he instructed all his sincere friends (mukhlisān) to
keep her pleased as much as possible. After the martyrdom of Mirzā Mazhar in
1195/1781 at the hands of a religious fanatic, his disciples followed the instruc-
tion and took utmost care of Mardum Maḥall for the next twenty years. She
died in 1801 in Panipat at the house of Maulawī Sanāʾu’llah Pānīpatī.93 Her
body was later brought to Delhi where she was buried in the house where her
husband, Mirzā Mazhar, was already buried.

(8)
Shāmma Bībī
Period: Fifteenth Century
Shrine: Poshkar, Kashmir

Shāmma Bībī94 was a mystic woman of great merits. She had the unique
honour of being one of the spiritual deputies (khulāfa‌ʾ) of Ḥaẓrat Shaikh
Nūru’d-Dīn Rishī (779/1378–842/1439) of Kashmir, popularly remembered even

91 Shāh Ghulām ʿAlī. 1309/ 1892. Maqāmāt-i Mazharī. Dihli: Maṭbaʿ Mujtabāʾi, p. 63.
92 Zahīru’l Ḥasan Kasolwī, who added his own stories while editing Maulānā Ashraf ʿAlī
Thānawī’s Ḥikāyāt-i Awliyāʾ in 1983, without mentioning the name of Mardum Maḥall,
writes that Mirzā Mazhar knowingly married a woman who was bad-tempered and used
excessively abusive language. He says nothing about her spiritual virtues, see Maulānā
Ashraf ʿAlī Thānawī. 1983. Ḥikāyāt-i-Awliyāʾ. Deoband: Khwāja Ajmeri Books House, p. 28.
93 For details, see ‘Edition of Bisharat-i-Mazhariyah,’ pp. 504–507.
94 Shāmma Bībī is referred by various names, such as Shām Bībī and Shām Ded.
350 Chapter 10

today as Ḥaẓrat Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam.95 There is, however, no letter of authorisa-

tion to show her appointment as the khalīfa. The only reference is the opening
line of Ghulām Ḥassan Khuihāmi in the notice on Shāmma Bībī that she was
one of the spiritual successors of Ḥaẓrat Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam (az khulāfā-yi Ḥaẓrat
Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam ast). Shaikh Nūru’d-Dīn, in the words of Ghulām Ḥasan, was the
best and the chosen one and known among all the Sufis of Kashmir (zubda‌ʾ-i
reshiyān, nāmdār wa bar-guzīda awliya‌ʾ) as unique in worshipping, abstinence,
ego control, and earnest striving (dar ʿibādat wa riyāẓat wa mujāhidāt wa nafs
kushī waḥīd-i ʿasr wa farīd dahar būd).96
The transformation of Shāmma Bībī from an ordinary young girl into a mys-
tic took place under miraculous circumstances. As narrated by Ghulām Ḥassan
Khuihāmi, it is said that on her wedding day (ba-roz-i zifāf) as Shāmma Bībī
was being carried to the house of her husband (dar khāna-yi shauhar mi bur-
dand), her glance fell upon Ḥaẓrat Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam. The moment she looked at
his face, she had a strange experience. Discarding the local traditions, which
prohibit a bride to show her face to a stranger, Shāmma Bībī stepped out of her
bridal litter and, placing her head at the feet of the Shaikh, began crying. At
this, the Shaikh advised her that considering the respect and dignity of her par-
ents (nāmūs-i wālidain), she must remain covered and serve her husband (dar
parda ba-nishīn wa khidmat-i shauhar kun). With humility and modesty (ba
chashm-i bīmār wa khāṭir-i afgār), Shāmma Bībī listened to this advice. From
that moment, however, Shāmma Bībī went through a charismatic transforma-
tion. Worldly dignity, riches, and power became meaningless for her. She devel-
oped a feeling of aversion (bezār shudā) for all material possessions. Engrossed
in remembering Allāh, she would eat nothing but wild vegetables (sāg-i jan-
gali) and would not even drink cold water. When asked why she would not eat
bread made of grain, she said it was because of following the way of her pīr (ba
mutābaʿat pīr-i khud).97
Ghulām Ḥassan Khuihāmi notes a large number of gnostic and mystical say-
ings (maqūlāt wa maʿārif) that are attributed to Shāmmā Bībī. So great was her
devotion to her Shaikh, Ḥaẓrat Nūru’d-Dīn Rishī, that often she would say that
a pīr is the fountainhead of life (pīr chashma-i āb-i ḥaiwān ast); one who drinks
from it is purified. She would often express her wish to get close to the status
of Bābā Naṣru’d-Dīn or Naṣr Rishī (d. 855/1451), a favourite disciple and deputy

95 For her life account, see Tārīkh-i Ḥasan, pp. 116–125.

96 Ibid, p. 116.
97 Ibid, pp. 144–145.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 351

of Ḥaẓrat Nūru’d-Dīn Rishī.98 One of her mystical sayings is that revealing

the secrets of Allāh is worse than killing thousands of innocents (afshān kar-
dan darūn-i ḥaqq badtar az hazār khūn-i naḥaqq). Shāmma Bībī told her dis-
ciples that though men have authority in this world (dar jahān mardān afsar
ast), in the heavenly kingdom (dar malakūt) their status depends on courage
(himmat muʿtabar). A man without courage (mard bi-himmat) is worse than
a woman; a woman with courage is noble and better (afẓal wa bihtar) than
a man. Expressing stages of her mystical experiences, she used to say that in
seeking union with God she was intoxicated, and in ecstasy lost recognition of
her own self; recognizing herself, she recognised God (Chūṅ bākhudā būdam
bikhud būdam; chūṅ bākhud būdam bi khudā būdam).99
Shāmma Bībī, known as the first woman poet, is said to have composed
the first elegy in Kashmiri language to mourn the death of her spiritual men-
tor, Ḥaẓrat Nūru’d-Dīn Rishī.100 Subsequent to the sad demise of her Shaikh,
Shāmma Bībī, following the traditions of Ḥaẓrat Nūru’d-Dīn Rishī, travelled
widely in the region. Her worldly life came to its end in Poshkar, at the hermit-
age of Shaikh Bābā Laṭīfu’d-Dīn Rishī, the third deputy (khalīfā) of Nūru’d-Dīn
Rishī.101 She was buried within the shrine complex.

(9)
Sangha Bībī
Period: Sixteenth Century
Place: Hamal, Kachal, Kashmir

The narrative of Sangha Bībī is most unusual. According to Ḥasan Khuihāmi,

she is reported to have had a male disciple, Bābā Nekī Rishī, who later became

98 Bābā Naṣru’d-Dīn lies buried within the shrine of his Shaikh at Charār Sharīf is in Badgam
district of J& K. For his short biographical notice, see Tārīkh-i Hassan, pp. 137–39; see
Rishī namā (composed in 1223/1832) (Edited by Muhammad Asadullah Wani and Masud
Samun, Jammu & Kashmir Academy of Art, Culture and Languages, Srinagar, 1882,
pp. 114–119) of Mullā Bahāu’d-Dīn Matu (d. 1248/1833) (for instructions given by Ḥaẓrat
Nūru’d-Dīn Rishī to Bābā Naṣru’d-Dīn. For dialogue between Ḥaẓrat Nūru’d-Dīn Rishī
and Bābā Naṣru’d-Dīn, see Pandit Anand Koul. 1930. “A Life of Nand Rishi,” The Indian
Antiquary, vol. 59 (February): 28–32.
99 Tārīkh-i Ḥasan, p. 145.
100 For the original elegy and its English translation, see Appendix E & F in Mohammad Ishaq
Khan. 1994. Kashmir’s Transition to Islam: The Role of Muslim Rishis (Fifteenth to Eighteenth
Century). New Delhi: Manohar, pp. 258–260. Also, see Muhammad Asadullah Wani. 1993.
Shaikhu’l ʿĀlam: ek muṭālaʿ. Srinagar: Mirzā Publications, p. 115.
101 For a short biographical notice of Shaikh Bābā Laṭīfu’d-Dīn Rishī, see Tārīkh-i Ḥasan,
pp. 136–137.
352 Chapter 10

her khalīfa. Ḥasan Khuihāmi begins his narrative on Bābā Nekī Rishī by pre-
senting some unique and rather startling information that is not found any-
where else about any other Sufi women in the sources on Sufi women of South
Asia. He writes Bābā Nekī Rishī khalīfa-yi Sangha Bībī ast (Bābā Nekī Rishī is the
spiritual successor of Sangha Bībī).102
Mullā Bahāu’d-Dīn Mattu (d. 1832), in Rishī namā, a versified account of
Sufis of Kashmir (composed in 1223/1808) paid highest homage to the remark-
able ascetic virtues of Sangha Bībī, a gnostic of Kashmir who like a true Sufi
was zāhida (renunciate) and ʿābida (devoted to Allāh). He compares her to a
shining star (akhtar-i pur-nūr) filled with the Blessed Light (nūr-i saṭīʿa). Living
in seclusion in the mountainous region of Khuihāma, surrounded by the scent
of saffron (gul-i ʿaṅbrīṅ), Sangha Bībī was intoxicated by Divine Presence (mast
shud zi jām-i shuhūd) and was absorbed by Celestial Manifestation (maḥw dar
tajallī būd).103
In his Tārīkh-i Ḥasan’s section on the Sufis of Kashmir, which is titled Asrāru’l
Akhyār (the secrets of the Chosen), Ghulām Ḥasan Khuihāmi (d. 1898) wrote
a short notice on Sangha Bībī. In it, he extols her virtues as a mystic par excel-
lence and comments that she was known as a female worshipper of the high-
est rank. She belonged to the village of Kachalwan in the pargana of Ḥamal.104
Ḥasan Khuihāmi identifies her as ʿābidāt-i Ḥaqq saʿīd muṭlaq (devotee of the
Absolute Truth).105 Rawẓatu’l Abrār identifies her as an ʿārifa who manifested
several miraculous powers (karamāt bisyār).106
Ḥasan Khuihāmi is silent about Sangha Bībī’s early life. Rafiqi, however, on
the authority of Bābā Naṣību’d-Dīn Rishī (d. 1047/1637) says that Sangha Bībī
came from a wealthy family. She had seven sisters and all of them renounced
the world.107 Sangha Bībī, after severing her relations with the world, became a
disciple of Shukru’d-Dīn and made the forest of Ᾱham in Khuyham her abode.
From Bābā Shakūru’d-Dīn Walī she learned the rules of ṭarīqat. People of the

102 Tārīkh-i Ḥasan, p. 165.

103 Mullā Bahāu’d-Dīn Matu.1223/1832. Rishī namā (Edited by Muhammad Asadullah Wani
and Masud Samun, Jammu & Kashmir Academy of Art, Culture and Languages, Srinagar,
1982, pp. 311–314).
104 Tārīkh-i Ḥasan, p. 164.
105 Ibid, p. 164.
106 Muḥammad Amīn Ḥanafī. Rawẓatu’l Abrār yʿānī Ḥaẓrāt-i Kashmir (Sirāju’l Maṭbaʿ,
Jhelum, 1302/ 1884), p. 36.
107 Abdul Qaiyyum Rafiqi. Sufism in Kashmir from the Fourteenth to the Sixteenth Century.
PhD Thesis submitted to the Australian National University, 1972, p. 257.
http://hdl.handle.net/1885/11225, DOI: 10.25911/5d74e508a72bd.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 353

neighbourhood built a cottage for her. There in the forest, she befriended ani-
mals and looked after a large herd of cattle.108
As an adept Sufi, she was well versed in mystical exercises which she mas-
tered by her devotion and by engaging in intense remembrance of Allāh. She
used to fast continuously and pray at night regularly.109 She could converse
with wild beasts such as lions. Mullā Bahāu’d-Dīn Matu, in Rishī namā (com-
posed in 1223/1808), an account of the Sufis of Kashmir in verse, expressing this
power of Sangha Bībī writes that she could talk with lions, panthers, dragons,
and serpents (guft sher wa palang wa azhdar wa mār).110
According to one legend given by Ghulām Ḥasan Khuihāmi, once when a
lion caught one of her attendants by the head, the Bībī said to the lion, “Why
have you molested an innocent man?” The lion heard her voice and released
the man. Rafiqi, adding more details to this legend on the authority of Bābā
Naṣību’d-Dīn, says that once the disciple was released, Sangha Bībī had a con-
versation with the disciple. She said that the incident of the lion attacking her
disciples happened because one of them had done mischief. One of her dis-
ciples then confessed that he had hidden some corn in her store. Sangha Bībī
was much grieved and declared, “What greater theft could be committed by
the Rishīs.”111
An interesting fact about Sangha Bībī which makes her narrative distinct
from the accounts of other female Sufis is that a male, Sufi Bābā Nekī Rishī,
was her disciple and later became her khalīfa. Honouring the excellent mysti-
cal status of Bābā Nekī Rishī, Ḥasan Khuihāmi writes that he was ṣāḥib-i warʿ
wa taqwā az ahl-i ṣafā būd (an abstinent, virtuous person of the group of Sufis).
He had served Sangha Bībī for a long time and was her closest attendant and
disciple. He was not only the manager and administrator of her place of stay
(muntazim maqām) but was the keeper of her coffer (ṣandūq-dār). Subsequent
to Sangha Bībī’s demise, not only did he become her spiritual successor but
also inherited all her money and other possessions, including her cattle (māl
wa maweshī). He gave away the money and cattle to the poor and the needy
in charity (ṣadaqa) and also used to feed by his own hands at least four cattle
each day.112 Devotees continue to visit her shrine to gain her blessings.

108 Tārīkh-i Ḥasan, p. 164.

109 Ibid, p. 164.
110 Rishī namā, p. 312.
111 Abdul Qaiyyum Rafiqi. Sufism in Kashmir from the Fourteenth to the Sixteenth Century.
PhD Thesis submitted to the Australian National University, 1972, p. 258.
http://hdl.handle.net/1885/11225, DOI: 10.25911/5d74e508a72bd.
112 Ibid, p. 259; also, see Sayyid Muhammad Yusuf Bukhari. 1999. Tazkira Ṣūfiyya‌ʾ-yi Kashmir.
Lahore: Oriental College, p. 202.
354 Chapter 10

10.2 Sufi Women’s Spiritual Sessions for Women Only

(1)
Bībī Bebe
Period: Seventeenth Century
Place: Quṣūr, Punjab, Pakistan

A biographical compendium, Akbāru’l awliyāʾ min lisānu’l aṣfiyāʾ (Tales of

friends of God as a tribute to the holy persons), compiled by Shaikh Ghulām
Muʿīnu’d-Dīn ʿAbdullah—known as al-Khalīfa al-Kheshgī al-Chishtī in 1077/
1666–1667 while he was serving as an employee of a Mughal noble in the
Deccan—is a storehouse of information of the life of Pashtūn women living in
the Quṣūr region of Punjab. In chapter three of this work, which still remains
in manuscript form, Kheshgī, under the heading dar bayān aḥwāl nisā ʿārifāt
Kheshgīān wa sāʾir-i Afghānīān (an account of pious women of the Kheshgīs
and travellers [of the Path] from the Afghānīs), narrates these life stories.113
Among these pious women, one is Bībī Bebe, a Ḥusainza‌ʾī Pashtūn of the
Shammuza‌ʾī tribe. Bībī Bebe was a person of great piety whose life was marked
by continuous and intense prayers and submission to God. From her midnight
prayers (tahajjud) till the predawn prayers ( fajr), she would remain awake,
occupied in remembering Allāh by doing zikr-i khafi (silent recollection and
invocation of God) and shughl-i jārob (spiritual exercise of cleansing the heart
[as a brush or broom will do]), which is the highest Sufi exercise of breath
control.114 Here, Kheshgī digresses slightly from the narrative and devotes
a long paragraph to methods and ways of doing zikr. It is also possible that
Kheshgī’s intent in explaining the methods of zikr performance was to show
that women could also do this spiritual exercise.
Returning to the story of Bībī Bebe, Kheshgī writes that most of the time, the
Bībī used to recite the Qurʾān. A striking and distinctive feature about Bībī Bebe
was her quality of sharing her knowledge and experiences with her women
contemporaries. Thus, all the time (har dam) she used to warmly and cordially

113 For details about the holdings of the different copies of the MS, see Muḥammad Iqbal
Mujaddidī’s biography of Kheshgī, Aḥwāl wa asār ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī Quṣūrī (Lahore:
Dāru’l Muarrikhīn, 1972), pp. 77–79; I have consulted MS (no. R343) of the Iqbal Mujaddidī
collection, Punjab University, Lahore.
114 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fol. 126a. Kheshgī, here cites a passage, in verse form,
from Talqīnu’l Murīdīn, explaining the method of performing shughl-i jārob, saying that
its purpose is to seek Divine proximity (qurb-i ḥaqq). I could not find Talqīnu’l Murīdīn.
For the importance and performance of shughl-i jārob, see a later source, Ẓiāʾu’l qulūb by
Imdādu’llah Makkī (Maṭbʿ Aḥmadī, Lucknow, 1332/1914), pp. 40–41.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 355

meet with other women of faith (muʾmināt). To all those who kept company
with her, she would preach and counsel (waʿz wa naṣāʾīḥ).115 Here, one wishes
for further details about these women’s spiritual gatherings. The reference,
though brief, is of critical significance for two reasons. First, it undoubtedly
evidences people’s acceptance of Sufi women in society. Second, not only does
it negate the traditional image of a Muslim woman—particularly a Pashtūn
woman—as one bonded within the walls of her home, but on the contrary
presents them as women who knew their identity, were knowledgeable, and
as true seekers of more knowledge, travelled to acquire it. Thus, these women
attendees were not commonplace persons who would have merely social
meetings. Kheshgī presents these women by using the Qurʾān’s term for the
highest category of obedience to Allāh for women—muʾmināt, the feminine
noun of the male plural noun muʾminīn in the Arabic language. The Qurʾān’s
definition of muʾminūn says that “Only those are Believers (muʾminūn) who
have believed in Allāh and His Messenger, and have never since doubted, but
have striven with their belongings and their persons in the Cause of Allāh:
Such are the sincere ones” (49:15).
These women’s gatherings at Bībī Bebe’s house, indeed, in all probability
were sessions of spiritual discourses. The use of the descriptive phrases in
Kheshgī’s brief annotation of Bībī Bebe’s narrative are of immense significance.
These meetings were held constantly and Bībī Bebe was busy preparing and
giving her sermons all the time (har dam). Kheshgī is not limiting these ses-
sions to a fixed schedule; instead, by using the two words har dam—which lit-
erally mean “each and every single breath”—he elevates these gatherings from
women’s neighbourhood chat groups to the sublime level of spiritual sessions.
As these women constantly sought and were present in her company, Kheshgī
addresses them as ahl-i ṣuḥbat. A ṣuḥba, the Arabic term for its Persian ṣuḥbat,
in Sufi practices is an intimate conversational session of high spiritual level,
between the Sufi guide (shaikh) and the spiritual seeker or disciple (murīd) for
the purpose of the training of the latter group.116 Members of this group (ahl-i
ṣuḥbat) are thus followers and disciples of the Sufi teacher. My above explana-
tion is based on the two significant words of this narrative: waʿz wa naṣāʾīḥ. A
waʿz is a sermon and when delivered by a Sufi with the added self-explanatory
word naṣāʾīḥ, the nature of these sessions takes on a new image where the
mentor guides her disciples to the free universe of spiritual peace. This brief
observation, in Kheshgī’s estimation, was not worthy of further details and he

115 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fol. 127b.

116 See for more on this, Ahmet T. Karamustafa. 2007. Sufism. The Formative Period. Edin-
burgh: Edinburgh University Press, ps.120, 148.
356 Chapter 10

soon was taken over by self-glorification as he moved to describe the affin-

ity between himself and Bībī Bebe. We have chronologically documented
accounts of male discourse sessions (majālis) in the Sufi malfūzāt but none for
women’s assemblies has not yet come to light. With the unfortunate brevity of
Kheshgī’s account, invaluable details of this unique and rare case of women-
only spiritual learning sessions are lost.
It is relevant to reiterate here that the above biographical notice was recorded
by Kheshgī while he was posted in Awrangābād. While writing this notice, he
recalled his meetings with the God-fearing Bībī Bebe in Quṣūr while he was
still young (aṣghar). Out of her kindness and generosity (karm wa ʿināyat),
Bībī Bebe used to refer to Kheshgī as her son (pisar-i man). The relationship
between the two was so strong that not only in his presence, but in his absence
(dar ghaibat wa ḥuẓūr) as well, she would make him appear distinct (mumtāz)
by saying good words about him (zikr-i khair).117 The above lines about the
personal relationship between Bībī Bebe and her narrator are relevant to this
account as it assists us in verifying the authenticity of accounts based on mem-
ory and thus validates the role of memory in documenting history.

10.3 Women as Disciples of Their Fathers/Husbands/Sons/Brothers

(1)
Bībī Abdāl
Period: Fifteenth Century
Place: District Nalanda, Bihar
Shrine: Debi Sāra i, District Nalanda, Bihar

Bībī Abdāl’s real name was Khujasta Akhtar.118 Recounting oral history,
Ghulām Nabī Firdawsī, in his late nineteenth-century monumental work
Mirātu’l Kaunain (mirror of the worlds)—a biographical compendium of
men and women, both rulers and spiritual persons, arranged in chronologi-
cal order and drawing upon a variety of large sources, some of which are now
extinct—says that her original name was Bībī Johda.119 She came from a family
of several generations of pious, God-fearing mystic persons. Her father, Ḥaẓrat

117 Ibid, fol. 127b.

118 ῾Abdur Razzāq ῾Aṭā᾽ Ḥusain. Kanzu᾽l Ansāb. (Bombay: Maṭba῾ Ṣafdarī, 1302/1884), p. 85.
119 Ghulām Nabī Firdawsī in Mirātu’l kaunain (Lucknow: Nawal Kishore, 1894) gives her
name as Bībī Johida, p. 317. (Henceforth, referred to as Mirātu’l kaunain). (I wonder this
name could be a local corrupted form for Zāhida).
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 357

Makhdūm Badru’d-Dīn ʿĀlam Zāhidī (d. 844/1440) of the Junaidī silsila of the
Sufis is known by various appellations, such as Pīr Badr, Badar Maqām, and
Badr Awliyāʾ.120 His family is said to have arrived from Arabia and settled in
Meerut, in North India. At the invitation of Sharfu’d-Dīn Aḥmad ibn Yaḥyā
Manerī (d. 1381) of Bihar, Makhdūm Badru’d-Dīn left Meerut in 1380 and
arrived in Bengal.
In Bihar, his piety and devotion to Allāh inspired many to enter Islam.
Legends describe Badru’d-Dīn as the guardian saint of sailors and boatmen,
recognised by both the Hindus and Muslims.121 Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf, writing
in 1788–1789, noted that the shrine of Pīr Badr radiates wondrous miracles
(bā-kamāl khwāriq) and in its sublime grandeur many people found their
needs fulfilled. Whenever a boat was caught in high seas by strong winds, as
soon as the troubled boatman, whether infidel or Muslim, calls out loudly and
repeatedly and eloquently to Pīr Badr or one of his popular aliases, the boat is
saved from drowning and from the tempest.122
Recounting oral history, Ghulām Nabī Firdawsī in his Mirātu’l Kaunain, nar-
rates that once in her childhood, Bībī Abdāl donned the dastār (wrap around
the turban) of her father and ran outside the house. Since then, she came to
be known as Bībī Abdāl.123 Brought up under the care of her father, Bībī Abdāl
followed the same pathway as was practiced by her illustrious father. She was
a disciple of her father as she took the oath of allegiance at his hands. Since
early childhood, she spent most of her time in offering prayers and in the
remembrance of Allāh. Often, she remained in the mystical state of ecstasy
(ḥālat-i jazb). Several miracles are associated with her. Later, her father mar-
ried her to one of his students, Saiyyid Aḥmad, who came to Bihar from the

120 For short biographical notice of Badru’d-Dīn Badr-i-ʿĀlam, see Mirātu’l kaunain, Ibid.,
pp. 371–373; H. Blochmann. 1873. “Geography and History of Bengal.” Journal of the Royal
Society of Bengal, 42(3):209310; R.C.T. 1894. “Pir Badar in Burma.” Journal of the Royal
Society of Great Britain and Ireland (July), pp. 566–76; John Beames. 1894. “The Saint Pir
Badar.” Journal of the Royal Society of Great Britain and Ireland, pp. 838–40.
121 L.S.S. O’Malley. 1908. Eastern Bengal District Gazetteer. Chittagong. Calcutta: The Bengal
Secretariat Book Depot, pp. 56–57; Sir Richard Temple, in 1925 noted the presence of
small shrines across the eastern Indian Ocean built by Muslim sailors, which he called
“Buddermokan” (badr-muqam). Badr-al-Din Awliya, Temple writes, ‘is worshipped as a
spirit (nat) by the Buddhist, as a lesser god (deva) by the Hindus, as a sacred spirit by
the Chinese and as a Sufi by the Muslims. His worship was the same as that offered
throughout the region to spirits and supernatural creatures, revered by the whole popula-
tion, regardless of religion.’ See, R.C. Temple. 1925. “Buddermokan.” Journal of the Burma
Research Society 15(1): 1–33.
122 Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf. Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, pp. 84–85.
123 Mirātu’l Kaunain, p. 373.
358 Chapter 10

outside (wilāyat) to seek knowledge at his khānqāh. He was the son of Saiyyid
Muḥammad bin Saiyyid ʿAlīmu’d-Dīn Gīsū Darāz. Soon, the couple had a son
and named him Saiyyid Maḥmūd.124 While the baby was still breastfeeding,
Bībī Abdāl requested her husband to marry again as married life did not suit her
and was hindering her from worshipping and serving Allāh. The husband, as
he found her engrossed in Allāh’s remembrance all the time, agreed to remarry.
Soon after her husband married a girl of a Saiyyid family, Bībī Abdāl retired to
a small room to pray and contemplate. She was so greatly enraptured (ḥālat-i
sakr) by the Divine manifestation that, in her enraptured state, riding a lion
and holding a black snake in her hand as if it were a whip, she left her home
and her baby and began roaming in the wilderness. Returning to a normal state
of sobriety (sahw), she came back home but remained deeply intoxicated by
Allāh’s remembrance. Like a perfect Sufi, her trust in Allāh was strong and her
patience was exemplary. Whenever her maidservants would tell her that there
was nothing in the house to prepare a meal, she would starve. Instead of com-
plaining, Bībī Abdāl would be thankful for Allāh’s bounty because missing a
meal would free her of being accountable before Allāh for consuming food.
Legends say that because she rode a lion and controlled a black cobra, these
two cannot harm her descendants.125
Mirātu’l kaunain narrates several other hagiographical accounts of Bībī
Abdāl’s miracles. Once, while she was sitting in a boat in a state of deep medita-
tion, she became irritated by a crying baby and threw it in the river. On hearing
the wails of the mother, she put her hand in the deep waters and took out the
child who was laughing and giggling and was unhurt. Similarly, by her miracu-
lous powers, an empty food cauldron got filled and she fed a large number of
people by serving them with her own hands.126 Her son, Makhdūm Saiyyid
Maḥmūd, was a disciple and a khalīfa of her elder brother, Ḥaẓrat Makhdūm
Shāh Shihābu’d-Dīn Qattāl Zāhid.
Bībī Abdāl’s chillā is in Bībīpur. Villages around this area are given as tax-
free villages (muʿāfī) to her descendants. While dates of birth and death of her
father and brothers are known, the same about her are not found recorded
anywhere. Her shrine is managed by the All India Ulama and Mashaikh Board,
Delhi.127

124 Kanzu᾽l Ansāb. p. 85; Mirātu’l kaunain, 373.

125 Shāh Farzand ʿAlī. 1313/1895. Wasīla-i Sharf Zarīʿa-i Daulat. Patna: Maṭbaʿ Aḥsanu’l Maṭabʿ,
pp. 175–76.
126 Mirātu’l kaunain, p. 374.
127 www.aiumb.org › sufism › dargahs-in-india dargahs-in-india.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 359

(2)
Phūl Bībī
Date: D. 5 Muḥarram 1172/8 September 1758
Shrine: Damgaŕh Sharīf, Allahabad

Phūl Bībī (the flower lady),128 wife of Ḥaẓrat Shāh Muḥammad Māh Qalandar
(1140/1728), hailed from Soth of Pargana Sakar of Allahabad. Though little is
known about her early life, we do have details about her later life as the wife
of a devout Sufi, and as the mother of three sons each of whom reached the
highest stations of mystic path and left a trail of excellent (kāmil) Sufis which
continues until today. Phūl Bībī is one of those veiled friends of Allāh who
walked on the path of a devoted Sufi all through their life with no exposure to
the world outside.
Shāh Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar Kākorwī (1181/1768–1275/1858),129 the devoted dis-
ciple of Phūl Bībī’s son, Ḥaẓrat Shāh Bāsiṭ ʿAlī Qalandar Allahabadī (d. 1782),
writes that Shāh Muḥammad Māh Qalandar was one of the trustworthy and
perfect spiritual deputies (az khulafāʾ-yi muʿtabarīn wa kāmilīn) of Ḥaẓrat Shāh
Mujtabā Qalandar, known as Shāh Majjā Qalandar (d. 1084/1673),130 who dis-
seminated and rejuvenated this sublime (i.e., Qalandariyyā) silsila.131 At the
orders of his Shaikh, Shāh Muḥammad Māh Qalandar, who lived for 125 years,

128 For her life, see Shāh Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar ʿAlawī Kākorwī. 1293/1876. Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ
(publisher’s name not given), pp. 296–98.
129 Shāh Turāb ῾Alī Qalandar’s shrine is in Kākorī and attracts large number of devotees,
see Masʿūd Anwar ʿAlawī Kakorwī. 1990. Tafṣīlāt mazarāt ṣāḥibān-i khānqāh kazimi-
yya kakorwī. Kākorī Sharīf: kutubkhānā Anwariyya, pp. 25–35. For his life account, see
Taqī Anwar ʿAlāwī Kāzimī Kākorwī. 1985. Tazkira Gulshan-i karam-dargah ʿālam panāh
kazimiya. Kākorī: Kutubkhānā Anwariya Takiyā Sharīf. pp. 65–102.
130 Shāh Majjā Qalandar Lahirpur lies buried in Lahirpur, close to Khairabad, UP. Shāh Majjā
Qalandar who remained lost, so intensely, day and night in Allāh’s remembrance (shab wa
roz dar zikr wa fikr mashghūl shudand) that he would forget to eat and drink, ease nature,
and prayers and fasting. He had a large following and several spiritual deputies (khalifā-i
īshāṅ bisyār būdand). In addition to two books Ḥujjtu’l ʿĀrifīn and Manāqibu’l khulafāʾ,
he regularly corresponded with his disciples and followers. For his letters, see Tʿālimāt-i
Qalandarīya compiled by Ḥaẓrat Maulānā Shāh Muḥammad Taqī Haidari Alāwī,
Lucknow: Barqi Press, 1932; Esha Basanti Joshi. 1964. Uttar Pradesh District Gazetteers:
Sitapur. Lucknow: Govt. of Uttar Pradesh, Dept. of District Gazetteers, p. 216.
131 Shāh Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar. 1312/1894. Uṣūlu’l maqsūd. Lucknow: Asaḥḥu’l maṭabʿ, p. 9;
for his life account, see Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ, pp. 220–224. He wrote two Farsi works,
Manāqibu’l Khulafāʾ and Ḥujjatu’l ʿᾹrifīn. See Esha Basanti Joshi. 1964. Uttar Pradesh
District Gazetteers: Sitapur. Lucknow: Govt. of Uttar Pradesh, Dept. of District Gazetteers,
p. 216; also, Ḥabību’llah Mukhtār. 2000. Anwāru’l Awliyāʾ. Ed. by Saiyyid Niʿmatu’llah.
Karachi: Bisāt-i Adab, pp. 68–75.
360 Chapter 10

at the age of eighty years sent a proposal of his second marriage to marry
the young daughter of a person named Lālā Miyāṅ son of Saiyyid Aḥmad.132
Although the family members of Lālā Miyāṅ opposed this proposal because of
the advanced age of Shāh Muḥammad Māh Qalandar, he finally married this
young girl, Phūl Bībī, who became the mother of three noteworthy sons.133
Phūl Bībī’s household in Damgaŕh, where she came after her marriage,134
similar to the Triveni Sangam of Prayag (Allahabad), emerged as the conflu-
ence of the three most revered streams of eighteenth-century North India
Sufism representing Damgaŕh Sharīf, Laharpur, and Kākorī Sahrīf. Her hus-
band, Shāh Muḥammad Māh Qalandar of the Qādirīyyā-Qalandariyyā Sufi sil-
sila, traced his lineage to Ḥaẓrat ʿAlī and always remained engrossed in prayers,
worshipping, and meditation. As his time was spent continuously in medita-
tion, he never stretched his legs and used to say that one stretches his legs only
in the grave.135 Prayers, meditation, and abstinence bring one into proximity
to the Divine (qurb-i Iāhī) and nearness to Muḥammad and ʿAlī (ra) (ḥuẓūrī
Muḥammad wa Murtaẓawī ḥāsil būd).136
Shāh Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar, in a separate biographical notice on her, addresses
Phūl Bībī as makhdūma and describes her as one of the pious and perfect virtu-
ous women with excellence (az nisāʾyi ṣāliḥāt wa kāmilāt) who was extremely
pious with intense devotion for Allāh (nihāyat zāhida wa khudā parast).137 Her
qualities of abstinence and love for poverty were further chiselled by the
blessed company of her husband. Thus, she attained a status which would be
often blessed by the presence (ḥuẓūrī) of Ḥaẓrat ʿAlī.
This God-fearing couple lived in some comfort. One day, however, Phūl Bībī
asked her husband how her ancestor ( jadda-i man) Ḥaẓrat Bībī Fāṭima lived
her life. To this the husband replied that she lived a life of hardship, poverty,
and abstinence (taklīf wa ʿusrat wa zuhd). Hearing this, Phūl Bībī instantly
decided and declared that all the prosperity and affluence that they had was no
longer acceptable to her (īṅ daulat wa farāghat khush namī āyad) and therefore

132 Shāh Muḥammad Māh Qalandar’s first wife, his maternal cousin, whom he married at the
age of sixty, died leaving behind two sons (the first one died in infancy). See Ibid, p. 128.
133 Ibid, p. 128. Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar gives this story in Uṣūlu’l maqsūd also, see p. 228.
134 The village of Damgaŕh in the Handiya tehsil of Allahabad was the abode of Nishapuri
Saiyyids to which Ḥaẓrat Shāh Muḥammad Māh Qalandar belonged. See, William
Hoey, 1898. Memoirs of Delhi and Faizabad: Being translation of the Tarikh Farahbakhsh
of Muhammad Faiz Bakhsh from the original Persian, vol. 2. Allahabad: The Government
Press, p. 218.
135 Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ, p. 235.
136 Ibid.
137 Shāh Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar gives the story of Phūl Bībī with no variation of the text in his
two works, i.e., Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ, pp. 296–298 and Uṣūlu’l maqṣūd, pp. 165–167.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 361

she gave away all the comforts and adopted a life of faqr-i Muḥammadi wa
Murtaẓawī (the poverty of Muḥammad and of ʿAlī Murtazā). Though the hus-
band tried to dissuade her from adopting this abstinence and inconvenience—
as adoption of poverty and starvation is a difficult task—Phūl Bībī did not
change her decision. She argued that for her, the poverty of Muḥammad and
of ʿAlī Murtazā was right. Like a Sufi, fearful of worldly comforts, she ques-
tioned the ultimate futility of worldly possessions and argued that, after all,
what would all this prosperity accomplish (īṅ farāghat chih kār āyad). At last,
Shāh Muḥammad Māh Qalandar agreed and said that whatever she wished he
was with her. From that day onwards, the household went through unspeak-
ably difficult times. Shāh Turāb ʿAlī Qalandar, her biographer and a disciple
of her son Shāh BāsiṭʿAlī Qalandar, admiring her decision, comments that the
status and rank (darajā) of Phūl Bībī (as a Sufi) is linked to the fact that she
chose a life of poverty, because voluntary poverty is extremely demanding
( faqr ikhtiyārī bisyār mushkil ast).
Phūl Bībī was a disciple of her son, Shāh BāsiṭʿAlī Qalandar138 of the Qādirī
silsila and who was the khalifā of Shāh Illahdiyā Aḥmad Qalandar of Laharpur
(d. 1147/1735).139 On the authority of Shāh BāsiṭʿAlī, Shāh TurābʿAlī narrates
another incredible anecdote. This story says that as the time of her death
approached, her looks turned youthful (shakl jawānī namūdā shud) and she
began chanting a welcome song/nuptial song (sohal). Being asked why she was
singing, she replied that it was to welcome a son that soon would be born to her
grandson Masʿūd ʿAlī. Reciting the kalimā ṭayyaba, she then breathed her last.
Shāh BāsiṭʿAlī further narrates that after forty days, while engrossed in wor-
ship and Allāh’s remembrance, suddenly he remembered his mother. Instantly
he was transported into the presence of his mother and enquired about her
welfare in the other world. The dead Phūl Bībī said that as soon as she left this
world, she found herself in the presence of Ḥaẓrat Khātūn-i Jannat (the Blessed
lady of Heaven, meaning the Prophet’s daughter Ḥaẓrat Bībī Fāṭima), who at
once deputed all the women who were in her service to wait upon Phūl Bībī.

138 Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ, pp. 227–235. A Persian chronogram on his tomb in Damgaŕh gives
the date of his demise as 1196/1782. See A. Führer. 1891. The Monumental Antiquities and
Inscriptions in the North-Western Provinces and Oudh. Allahabad: The Government Press,
p. 143; a mosque adjacent to Shāh BāsiṭʿAlī Qalandar’s shrine bears a Persian chronogram
yielding the date of its construction to the year 1198 (1783–84) and assigns its construction
to Raja Tikait Rai (1760–1808), an officer in the accounts office of Awadh and a devo-
tee of Shāh BāsiṭʿAlī Qalandar. See, Usūlu’l maqsūd, p. 161; also Madhav N. Katti (Edited).
1996. Archaeological Survey of India: Annual Report of Epigraphy for 1992–93. New Delhi:
Archaeological Survey of India, p. 88.
139 For his biographical note, see Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ Ibid, pp. 226–227. Laharpur is now a
small town in District Sitapur, UP, India.
362 Chapter 10

She told her son, “I am very well and happy here, and I am in the presence of
Ḥaẓrat Khātūn-i Jannat.”
She died on 5 Muḥarram 1172/8 September 1758 and was buried in Bāgh-i
Ghawsu’l ʿĀzam in Damgaŕh, a garden laid out by her youngest son, Syed
Muḥammad Wāsil (known as Shahanshāh Qalandar) where he himself was
buried.140 Shahanshāh Qalandar died about four years before his mother in
1168/1755. Her eldest son, Ḥaẓrat Shāh Muḥammad Wāris, is also buried there.141

(3)
Bībī Sharīfa, Daughter of Bābā Farīd
Date: Thirteenth Century
Place: Ajodhan

Bībī Sharīfa, a thirteenth-century woman born into a family of exceptional

spiritual merits, has a significant place in rewriting the history of women, gen-
der, and Sufism. She was the second daughter of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i
Shakkar (1175–1265), the fountainhead of the Chishtī Sufi silsila whose message
has spread to almost the whole of South Asia, touching the hearts and the core
teachings of other faiths in India.142 Her mother’s identity, however, is not con-
firmed. ʿAlī Aṣghar Chishtī’s statement that Bībī Huzaira Khātūn, a daughter of
Sultan Balban of Delhi (d. 1287), was her mother remains doubtful as no other
scribe has mentioned it.143
Early Chishtī sources account for three daughters of Shaikh Farīd. Amīr
Khwurd, a contemporary whose immediate family had access to Shaikh Farīd’s
household, writes about his three daughters. Bībī Mastūra (the hidden one),

140 Ḥaẓrat Shahanshāh Qalandar who remained unmarried was a born Sufi who since early
childhood remained in spiritual ecstasy (ḥālat-i jazb). For more details of his life, see
Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ, pp. 239–242; The grave of Shahanshāh Qalandar in the Damgaŕh
shrine bears a Persian chronogram giving the date of his demise as Wednesday 2 Zilḥajj,
1168/September 9, 1755. According to another chronogram, his burial took place on
Thursday 3 Zilḥajj, 1168/ September 10, 1755. See Madhav N. Katti (Edited), op cit. 1996,
p. 89.
141 Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ, p. 298. Shāh Muḥammad Wāris who like his mother lived a life of
poverty. According to a hagiographical anecdote narrated by Shāh BāsiṭʿAlī Qalandar in
his Risālā Tuḥfā-yi Nishapūriā, Shaikh ʿAbdu’l Qādir Gīlānī conferred the cloak (khirqa)
and the club (ʿaṣā) upon Shāh Muḥammad Wāris. The anecdote further says that Ḥaẓrat
ʿAlī once told him that in rank, Shāh Bāsiṭ ʿAlī was equal to that of Sulṭanu’l ʿᾹrifīn Bāyazīd
Basṭāmi. For more details, see Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ, pp. 237–239.
142 For studies on his connections with the Sikh faith, see Rajwant Singh Chalana. 2005.
International Bibliography on Sikh Studies. The Netherlands: Springer.
143 ʿAlī Aṣghar Chishtī, Jawāhir-i Farīdī. Lahore: Victoria Press, p. 215; Rizvi rejects it as he
founds it historically incorrect. See A History of Sufism in India, vol. 1, p. 144.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 363

the eldest, remained a veiled, chaste, and saintly person until the very end of
her life. Several miracles were associated with her. Bībī Fāṭima was the third
and youngest daughter. She was the widow of Maulānā Badru’d-Dīn Isḥāq
(601/1205–670/1272), the most loyal, close, and trusted disciple of Bābā Farīd
and who also became one of his khalīfas. Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, fol-
lowing the death of Badru’d-Dīn Isḥāq, looked after the children born of this
marriage.144 Bībī Fāṭima’s two Sufi sons, Khwajā Muḥammad and Khwajā
Mūsā, grew into saintly persons of great merit.
Bībī Sharīfa, the middle daughter, similar to her two God-fearing pious sis-
ters, had also the quintessential characteristics of a friend of Allāh. Like the
other two, she also had the privilege of being brought up in a family that per-
sonified the Sufi ideal of faqr (poverty) and ṣabr (patience) under the care of
her grandmother, Bībī Qarsum Khatūn, and her father, Bābā Farīd. Her pater-
nal uncle, Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn Mutāwakkil (559/1164–671/1273), and her first
paternal cousin, ʿAlāʾud-Dīn Ṣābir of Kalyar Sharīf (d. 690/1291), who spent sev-
eral years in Bābā Farīd’s house, also must have left a mark on her. The environ-
ment in which she grew was thus the epitome of zuhd and taqwā.
Apart from her family background and circumstantial privileges, what
indeed made Bībī Sharīfa an exceptional person in the estimation of her father,
Bābā Farīd, a man who created and polished gems of the Chistiyya silsila in
South Asia, were her inner virtues that she acquired by following the path of
the Sufi ṭarīqa.
The most important and cohesive statement, albeit brief, about Bībī Sharīfa’s
virtues and excellence comes from Saiyyid Muḥammad bin Mubārak bin
Muḥammad ʿAlawī Kirmānī, known as Amīr or Amīr Khwurd, the author of
Siyaru’l-Awliyāʾ, the earliest known and most authentic biographical compen-
dium of the Chishtī Sufis of the early period. Amīr Khwurd’s few lines—under
the heading nukta dar bayān fuẓāʾil wa ṣalaḥiyyāt wa karāmāt dukhtarān Shaikh
Shyūkhu’l-ʿālam Farīd al-ḥaqq wā dīn quds Allāh Sara h-ul ʿazīz (an account of
the subtleties of attainments, excellence, and virtues of the daughters of head
of the Shaikhs of the world, Farīdu’l-Ḥaqq, may God sanctify his grave)—helps
to conceptualise the virtues of Bībī Sharīfa.145 Before proceeding further, it is
essential at this point to establish the credibility of Amīr Khwurd’s text. Amīr
Khwurd’s family, the Kirmānīs, since the last two generations had remained the
most devoted disciples of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar and had access
to the family life of Bābā Farīd.146 A more significant fact is that Amīr Khwurd’s

144 SA, p. 202.

145 SA, p. 201.
146 For the service and devotion of the Kirmānīs, see SA, pp. 208–10; Rizvi, 1, pp. 158–59.
364 Chapter 10

paternal grandmother, Bībī Rānī, was also a murīd of Bābā Farīd, on whose
hands she had taken an oath of allegiance and in obedience to her Shaikh
had given up worldly possessions in favour of poverty and privation ( faqr wa
fāqa).147 She later served Bābā’s disciple and khalīfa, Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Din
Awliyāʾ, in Delhi. Thus, in view of this proximity and the historical validity of
the text, Amīr Khwurd’s few lines, six to be exact, carry more weight and cred-
ibility than lengthy hagiographical accounts do.
Let us now look at this account, which in its essence is a testimony coming
from a person none other than Bābā Farīd. Thus, this testimony is of great sig-
nificance and is sufficient to place Bībī Sharīfa in the cadre of acclaimed Sufis
who follow the path of ḥaqq (the ultimate Truth). Amīr Khwurd writes that of
Shaikh Farīd’s three daughters, Bībī Sharīfa, the second daughter, because of
her excellence in devotion and submission to God was the most exalted one
(bāsharf-iʿibādat wa ṭāʿat musharraf būd). Though widowed in the prime of her
youth, she had no desire for another husband until the last day of her life.148
Indeed, instead of showing an interest in remarrying, she remained engaged
and engrossed in remembering Allāh (ba ḥaqq mashghūl shud). In view of her
intense devotion and piety, Bābā Farīd said that “had it been permitted to give
the authorization for succession and the permission to sit on the rug of prayer
to a woman, I would have given it to Bībī Sharīfa” (agar ʿaurat rā khilāfat wa
sajjāda-yi mashāʾīkh dādan rawā būd man Bībī Sharīfa rā mī dādam).149 It is
not clear whether the next sentence following that one, “if other women had
been like her, women would have taken precedence over men,” is a saying of
Bābā Farīd or comes from Amīr Khwurd. Amīr Khwurd ends his account of
Bībī Sharīfa by quoting a verse of Saʿdī (d. 1291). However, he mixes two differ-
ent hemistiches from Sʿadī’s ode (qaṣīda) written in praise of Turkan Khatūn
(d. 1094), the chief consort of Malik Shāh1 of the Seljuk Empire.150
Viewed and assessed in the wider perspective of South Asian Muslim wom-
en’s lives, the narrative of Bībī Sharīfa acquires more significance than merely
a father’s decision not to give what a daughter deserves. The focal point of this
assessment rests in the sharply held debate whether depriving a woman of
what she qualifies for and deserves is fair and justified, and does such depri-
vation violate the spirit of the Qurʾān and is worthy of Sufi spirit or not. It
is also significant to consider that in the formative era of Muslim society in
Hindustan, a Sufi, i.e., Bābā Farīd, and a Sultan, i.e., Iltutmish (d. 1236), “seemed

147 SA, p. 209.

148 SA, p. 191.
149 SA, p. 191.
150 I am grateful to Dr. Ansar Zahid Khan and Kaleem Chaghtai of Pakistan Historical Society
for their help in identifying the misquoted couplet by Mīr Khwurd.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 365

to have thought along the same lines” in considering their daughters as their
future successors.151 The similarity, however, was short-lived as Iltutmish went
ahead with his decision, overriding male opposition, while Bābā Farīd hesi-
tated to put it into practice. Bībī Sharīfa’s deprivation of khilāfat, despite her
excellent Sufi virtues, finally runs parallel to Raẓiya Sultan’s (r. 1236–1240) nar-
rative of losing the support of the court elites and ultimately her crown and her
life, despite the spirit of the Qurʾān which teaches gender equity. How these
two incidences become a prelude to the overwhelming growth of misogynist
traditions is further evidenced in the words of Bābā Farīd’s contemporary
court chronicler, Minhāj-us Sirāj (b. 1193). Sirāj, writing about Raẓiya Sultan,
states that she was “a great sovereign, sagacious, just, benevolent, the patron of
the learned, a dispenser of justice, the cherisher of her subjects and of warlike
talent, endowed with all the admirable attributes and qualifications necessary
for a king … [b]ut she was not born of the right sex,”152 echoing Farīd’s decision.
Finally, that khilāfat was not conferred on Bībī Sharīfa because of her gender is,
thus, the core argument in her life and remains for most other Muslim women
of South Asia.
The continuity and tenacity of traditional treatment of women’s posi-
tion is so strong that in the early twentieth century, while endorsing Shaikh
Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar’s decision regarding Bībī Sharīfa’s khilāfat,
Maulānā Ashraf ʿAlī Thānawī (1863–1943)—a Sufi and a prolific author, and
affectionately addressed as Ḥakīmu’l ummā (the wise man of the [Muslim]
community)—could only argue that the Shaikh’s denial of khilāfat to the Bībī
was based on traditions. Addressing his audience, Thānawī presented a feeble
excuse by way of explanation and said, “Look! How meticulous care is taken in
following the Sharīʿat (Sharīʿat kā kis qadr daqīq atbāʿ hai) in spite of the pres-
ence of any clear dictum prohibiting (bawajūd kisī sarīḥ qaul-i nahī kai wārid
hone kai) [women holding khilāfat].”153

(4)
Bībī Ḥalīma
Period: Seventeenth Century
Place: Akora Khattak/Bannu, Pakistan

151 Tanvir Anjum, Chishtī Sufis in the Sultanate of Delhi 1190–1400. Karachi: OUP, 2011, pp. 158,
345.
152 Minhāj Sirāj Jūzjānī, and Ghulām Rasūl Mahr. 1985. Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī. jild awwal. Lahore:
Urdu Science Board, p. 806–7.
153 Thanawī, Maulānā Ashraf ʿAli. 1932. al-Sunnah al-Jaliyyah fi Chishtyyah al-ʿAliyyah. Dehli:
Kutubkhāna Ashrafiyh, pp. 58-59.
366 Chapter 10

Bībī Ḥalīma, the daughter of the eminent Pashtūn poet Khusḥāl Khan Khattak
(1613–1689), was a mystic poet and scholar of great merit ( fāẓila wa ʿārifa). The
only narrative that I could find about her is given in Pata Khazana (Hidden
treasury), an anthology of Pashto poets by Muḥammad Hotak.154 Hotak begins
this narrative by addressing Bībī Ḥalīma as durr-i shahwār-i ʿiṣmat (the pre-
cious pearl of chastity).155
Bībī Ḥalīma’s account is based on the testimony of Muḥammad Hotak’s
father, Da‌ʾūd Khan (1620–1724). On one visit of Da‌ʾūd Khan to Bannu, Bībī
Ḥalīma was apparently living there. While her father, Khusḥāl Khan Khattak,
was still alive, Bībī Ḥalīma studied several branches of learning (ʿulūm) and
memorised the Qurʾān and was a ḥāfiẓa. Her mystic nature led her to become
the disciple (murīd) of one Shaikh Sʿadi Lahorī. She took baiʿat at the hands
of her brother, ʿAbdu’l Qādir Khan, who was a khalīfa of Shaikh Saʿadi Lahorī.
Bībī Ḥalīma did not marry and spent most of her time in mystical pursuits and
studying books on taṣawwuf. She had studied several such books and could
explain the meanings of Masnawī Sharīf.156 She had also read Maktūbāt-i
Ḥaẓrat Imām Rabbāni (1564–1624). She used to teach other Pashtun women in
her brother’s house.
In her poetry, instead of worldly love, Divine love was the theme. Muḥammad
Hotak’s father could recite some of her poems. I quote here one such piece
from The Hidden Treasure:

To everyone I look
I picture His face,
I am overwhelmed with joy
By His charming face.157

154 Pata Khazana was written sometime in 1728–29 by Muḥammad Hotak under the patron-
age of Shāh Husain Hotak (1725–1738), ruler of the Hotak dynasty of Qandahar. The
book was, translated into Persian by Abdul Hai Habibi in 1944 and later published in
Kabul by the Pashto Academy in 1997. It was translated into English by Khushal Habibi
and published by the University Press of America, 1997. See Hotak, Muḥammad, ʿAbd
al-Ḥayy Ḥabībī, and Khushal Habibi. 1997. The Hidden treasure: a biography of Pas̲htoon
poets = Pat̲a k̲h̲azana. Lanham: University Press of America, pp. 137–38. All my references
are from this English translation and the original Pashto text. It was copied in 1303/1886
by Muhammad ʿAbbas Kasi of Quetta, Baluchistan. See Pata Khazana Original: https://
archive.org › details › BPataKhazanaOriginal.
155 Pata Khazana Original, p. 96.
156 Masnawi-i-Maʿnawi (also spelt as Mathnawi) of Jalal al-Din Muḥammad Balkhi, also
known as Rum.
157 The Hidden treasure: a biography of Pas̲htoon poets = Pat̲a k̲h̲azana, p. 138.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 367

(5)
Ḥaẓrat Naʿīma (Baŕī Ṣāḥiba)
Date: D. 1035/1626
Shrine: Bijapur, Karnatika, India

Muḥammad Ibrāḥim Zubairī Qādirī Shaṭṭārī Bijāpurī, in his biographical com-

pendium of Sufis of Bijapur in a separate section under the subheading of zikr
awliyāʾ-yi zumra-yi niswān Bijapur (an account of friends of Allāh in the cat-
egory of women), introduces Bībī Naʿīma, first as one of the perfect (kāmil)
women of her age and then as the mother of Ḥabīb Allāh Ṣibghat Allāhī (d.
1632).158 Bībī Naʿīma took baiʿat at the hands of her son. Known for her piety
and excellence in spiritual virtues, Ḥaẓrat Naʿīma also had attained the spiri-
tual power of performing miracles (karamāt).
Bībī Naʿīma lived through the most critical days in Bijapur’s history. Emperor
Shāhjahan’s (r. 1628–1658) military advancement against Bijapur and the other
Deccani states not only was a serious threat to the sovereignty of the states
but it also disturbed the serenity of the spiritual environment of the region.159
Although information about her illustrious son, Ḥabīb Allāh Ṣibghat Allāhī,
and her grandson Ḥaẓrat Muḥammad Ṣibghat Allāh, also known as Shāh
Ṣāḥib (d. 1660),160 is known, little is recorded about Bībī Naʿīma, except that
which is relational to the narrative of her son. In the narrative of Ḥabīb Allāh
Ṣibghat Allāhī, Ibrāḥim Zubairī mentions that his father was Mullā Aḥmad
bin Khalīlu’llah Qādirī who took good care of his son’s spiritual and religious
education.161 One can only assume that Mullā Aḥmad must have been a good
husband, too.
Ibrāḥim Zubairī says that Bībī Naʿīma was a disciple of her son with whom
she had performed baiʿat (oath of allegiance). Ḥabīb Allāh Ṣibghat Allāhī was
an influential Sufi with a large following.162 According to a narrative in the
malfūz of Sibghat Allāhī, since she took the baiʿat, day and night she remained
engrossed (mashghūl) in prayers and zikr. She acquired such excellent purifi-
cation of heart (ṣafāi’) that often while fully awake, she would witness ʿālam-i

158 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-yi Bijāpur, p. 224.

159 Ibrāḥim Zubairī writes that Ḥabīb Allāh Ṣibghat Allāhī assured his wife that the invading
Mughal forces under the command of Ᾱṣif Khan would not harm Bijapur. Indeed, the
author of his malfūz is cited to observe that Ḥabīb Allāh Ṣibghat Allāhī passed away to the
next world to ward off (dafʿ) this evil (balā), i.e. the Mughal onslaught, see Ibid., p. 72.
160 Ibid, pp. 63–74.
161 Ibid, p. 64.
162 For the life account of Ḥabīb Allāh Ṣibghat Allāhī, see Ibid, pp. 63–74; also, Azkār-i Abrār,
pp. 586–88.
368 Chapter 10

ghaib (the other world) and arwāḥ (spirits). Ḥabīb Allāh Sibghat Allāhī, her
son, relates another incredible story of her charismatic powers that when she
passed away he wanted to place the shajra (spiritual line of succession) in her
hand.163 A man holding the shajra stood near her coffin. All of a sudden, before
it could be placed inside the coffin, the shajra vanished miraculously from the
hands of the man holding it. Upon opening the coffin, the shajra was found
clutched in the right hand of the deceased Bībī Naʿīma. Her shrine is within the
mazār of Ḥabīb Allāh Ṣibghat Allāhī in Zuhrapur, Bijapur.164

10.4 Sufi Women: Mothers of Sufi Men/Women

(1)
Bībī Fāṭima, Mother of Miyāṅ Mīr
Period: Early Seventeenth Century
Place: Swistan, Sindh, Pakistan

Bībī Fāṭima’s life history is overshadowed by her illustrious children—

daughter, Bībī Jamāl Khatūn (d. 1647), and son Miyāṅ Mīr (d. 1635)165—whose
memories are preserved by the mystical writings of Muḥammad Dārā Shikūh
(1615–1659) and Jahān Ārāʾ Begam (1614–1681), son and daughter of the Mughal
Emperor Shāh Jahan (1599–1666). Here, I present the story of Bībī Fāṭima, not
in her capacity as a mother, but as a Sufi par excellence, whose prayers were
heard and answered without any intercessor. Indeed, despite scarce informa-
tion about her life, Bībī Fāṭima’s narrative emerges as a rare example of a Sufi
and as one who by her prayers and spiritual attention (tawajjuh) turned her
son and daughter into Sufis of excellent virtues.
Bībī Fāṭima lived and died in Swistan, Sindh, which lies between Thatta and
Bhakkar and is now known as Sehwan Sharif.166 She was the daughter of Qāẓī
Qāẓan (1463–1551), son of Qāẓī Abū Saʿīd, who besides being ḥāfiẓ-i Qurʾān (one

163 A shajara is similar to a family tree. In the Sufi traditions, it is a chronological order of Sufi
Shaikhs related by the baiʿah. In some Sufi traditions, it is permissible to place this written
record with the dead body in the grave at the time of the burial.
164 Ibid, p. 72.
165 For Miyāṅ Mīr, see Dārā Shikūh, Muḥammad. Sakīnatu’l-awliyāʾ. Lahore: Nawal Kishore
Steam Press. (n. d.), also Dārā Shikūh, Muḥammad. 1853. Safīnatu’l-awliyāʾ (Lithograph
text). Agra: Maṭbaʿ-i Madrasa Agra, pp. 116–22; also, see Brahma, Brahma Singh. 1994.
Haẓrat Miaṅ Mir and the Sufi tradition. Patiala: Publication Bureau, Punjabi University.
166 Muḥammad Dārā Shikūh. Sakīnatu’l-awliyāʾ. (Urdu tarjuma) Lahore: Nawal Kishore Steam
Press. (n. d.), p. 19; Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ Ṭhattāwī and Akhtar Rizvī. 1959. Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām.
Jamshoro: Sindhī Adabī Board. p. 427.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 369

who has memorised the Qurʾān) and qārī (one who recites the Qurʾān with
proper rules of recitation) was a great scholar of fiqh (Islamic jurisprudence)
and tafsīr (exegisis of the Qurʾān) and one of the earliest poets of the Sindhi
language. Mīr Mʿāṣūm Bhakkari (d. 1606), who completed his history of Sindh
in 1600, in a section on the scholars, Sufis, and poets of Sindh, pays rich tribute
to the devotion and virtues of Qāẓī Qāẓan and describes him as one of those
who achieved revelation (ahl-i mukāshafa) and was adorned with the virtues
of piety and abstinence (bā zuhud wa taqwā ārāstabūd).167 He was appointed
Qāẓī of Bhakkar but gave his job to his younger brother, Qāẓī Naṣru’llah, and
adopted a life of renunciation and solitude (tark wā tajrīd). Following the
path of abstinence and self-purification through ascetic discipline (riyāẓat wa
mjujāhada), Qāẓī Qāẓan attained great heights of walāyat.168
Bībī Fāṭima was married to Qāẓī Sāiʾṅ Dittā bin Qāẓī Qalandar Farūqī whose
lineage is traced to Caliph Ḥaẓrat ʿUmar Farūq. Mʿāṣūm Bhakkari describes
Qāẓī Sāi᾽ṅ Dittā as ṣāḥib-i kashf with an unusual ability to remember all the
texts that he read.169 Dārā Shikūh describes Sāi᾽ṅ Dittā as a person with
charismatic mystical powers (sāḥib-i karāmat) who had attained high state
(maqāmāt-i ʿāliya). Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ Thattawī, narrating the lives of the Sufis
and Shaikhs of Swistan, gives his name as Qāẓī Sāiʾṅ Dinno and writes that
he was known for his knowledge of shariʿat and ṭarīqat for his saintly virtues
throughout Sindh. ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ also says that later in his life, Qāẓī Sāʾīn Dinno
became a disciple of Saiyyid Muḥammad Jaunpuri (d. 1505).170
Bībī Fāṭima had seven children, all born rather in quick succession. The mar-
riage was short lived, as Qāẓī Sai᾽ṅ died when their second son, Miyāṅ Mīr, was
seven years old. Two of her children, Miyāṅ Mīr and Bībī Jamāl Khātūn, were
Sufis while the rest of her sons—Qāẓī Bolān, Qāẓī ʿUsmān, Qāẓī Ṭāhir, and Qāẓī
Muḥammad—were persons with saintly virtues and disciples of their brother,
Miyāṅ Mīr. We have no information about her second daughter, Bībī Badī.

167 Muḥammad Maʿṣūm Bhakkari, and ʿUmar Muḥammad Daudpota. Tārīkh-i-Sind: al-mʿarūf
Tārīkh-i-Mʿasūmī, (Poona: Maṭbʿ-i Qīmah, 1938), pp. 200–202. Ma‘ṣūm Bhakkari also notes
that Qāẓī Qāẓan was a follower and disciple of Saiyyid Muḥammad Jaunpuri; also, Azkār-i
Abrār, p. 275.
168 Muḥammad Dārā Shikūh. Sakīnatu’l-awliyāʾ. (Urdu tarjuma) (Lahore: Nawal Kishore
Steam Press. (n. d.), p. 20. Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ Ṭhattāwī and Akhtar Rizvī. Tuḥfatu’l-Kirām.
Jamshoro: Sindhī Adabī Board, 1959) p. 433; Motilal Wadhumal Jotwani. Sufis of Sindh,
(New Delhi: Publications Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Govt. of
India, 1986). pp. 34–57; Ayyappappanikkar. Medieval Indian literature: an anthology, (New
Delhi: Sahitya Akademi, 1997), p. 549–500.
169 Tārīkh-i-Sind: al-mʿarūf Tārīkh-i-Mʿasūmī, pp. 199–200.
170 Tuḥfatu’l-Kirām, pp. 434–435.
370 Chapter 10

Bībī Fāṭima, referred to as the Rābiʿa of her times, learned the Qurʾān by
heart.171 Few glimpses of Bībī Fāṭima’s life are found in Dārā Shikūh’s Ṣafīnatu’l
Awliyāʾ (the ship [or notebook] of the Sufis), a compendium of Sufis that he
compiled in 1631. As a humble Sufi, describing himself as faqīr ḥaqīr (the lowly
destitute),172 Dārā, in a notice on his Sufi teacher, Miyāṅ Mīr, adds few sen-
tences about Miyāṅ Mīr’s mother, Bībī Fāṭima. These few sentences are our
only source of information about her. Miyāṅ Mīr is said to have narrated that
he heard from his mother that when his elder brother was born, his mother by
her powers of kashf (mystical cognition) found out that this son of hers was not
an ʿārif (a gnostic). She then prayed to Allāh (manājāt kardand), “O’ God I wish
for a son—a perfect gnostic and hermit, engrossed always in remembering
you.” As soon as she uttered these words, the guardian angel (hātif) said, “Allāh
has bestowed upon you a son and a daughter with these attributes (bā īṅ ṣifāt
ʿaṭāʾ khwahid farmūd).” This account of Bībī Fāṭima hearing a voice that gave
her the good news of a son and a daughter who would become Sufis proves
her mystical powers. Thus, Miyāṅ Mīr and his sister, Bībī Jamāl, were born.
Miyāṅ Mīr also told Dārā that he learned the secrets of the other world from
his noble and respectable mother (kashf ʿālam-i malkūt rā pesh wālida mājida
muʿazzama khud ḥāṣil karda būdand).173 This further testifies that Bībī Fāṭima
was not only a Sufi but was also endowed with the ability to instruct others
in the path of Sufism. Later historians have built their theses on this primary
information given in Ṣafīnatu’l Awliyāʾ.174 None, however, has included her in
the list of women Sufis with the charisma of bringing up her two children as
Sufis.
Bībī Fāṭima lived and died in Swistan, a land that has produced countless
Sufis. Her story is an evidence that women are not only not a hurdle in the
path of the male Sufis, but they can fashion and make Sufis by training and
attention.

171 A.A. Rizvi. A History of Sufism in India, vol. 2. (Lahore Suhail Academy,2004), p. 480;
Biographical Encyclopaedia of Sufis: South Asia, pp. 516–17.
172 Faqīr in the ordinary sense means a beggar or a poor person; in Sufi terminology, it means
a person in need of Allāh’s Mercy. The literal meaning of ḥaqīr is low ranking, when used
as a mystical term for self-description it means humble status.
173 Muḥammad Dārā Shikūh. Safīnatu’l-awliyāʾ (Agra: Maṭba῾-i Madrasa Agra, 1853),
pp. 116–17.
174 Fatima Zehra Bilgrami. History of the Qādirī order in India: 16th–18th century. Delhi:
Idarah-i Adabiyat-i Dehli, 2005) pp. 113–114; Khazīnatu’l aṣfiyāʾ, p. 234.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 371

(2)
Bībī Hājara
Date: Thirteenth Century
Shrine: Khuldabad, India

Bībī Hājara, the mother of the Chishtī Sūfīs Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb and
Muntajibu’d-Dīn,175 is buried in Khuldabad largest and most beautiful shrine
complex, along with the tomb of Muntajibu’d-Dīn (d. 709/1309), known more
familiarly by his epithet, Zar Zarī Zar Bakhsh, giver of gold.176 The Zar Zarī Zar
Bakhsh dargāh, located at the edge of town at the foot of a rocky desolate hill,
has traditionally attracted the largest numbers of pilgrims throughout the year,
as the saint and his mother are understood to be powerful mediators. Devotees
travel long distances to petition Zar Zarī Zar Bakhsh’s help with matters such
as conceiving a healthy child or finding a spouse. Women visitors tie bangles
over the doorway of Bībī Hājara’s shrine as symbols of their petitions.
Bībī Hājara’s life story, despite the fact that she came from one of the most
revered Sufis of the first group of Chishtī Sufis of South Asia, remains blurred.
Most accounts say that she came from the town of Haṅsi (Haryana, India) and
was married to Shaikh Maḥmūd Hāṅswī. The couple had nine children, four
sons—Shaikh Burhānu’d-Dīn (654/1256), Shaikh Muntajibu’d-Dīn (675/1276–
1390), ʿAzīz Qattāl, and Abu’l Fatḥ—and five daughters—Bībī Khadīja, Bībī
ʿAʾisha, Bībī Maryam, Bībī Ᾱmna, and Bībī Ḥamīda.177
We have no information whether Bībī Hājara travelled along with her hus-
band, brothers, and daughters to Khuldabād or if they arrived earlier. What
we know is that one of her brothers, Sirāju’d-Dīn, is buried next to her.178 Her
grandson, Ḥaẓrat Muḥammad Shamsu’d-Dīn, one of her daughter’s sons,
arrived with her and is buried in the shrine of Zar Zarī Zar Bakhsh.179
Muḥammad ʿAbdu’l Majīd, referring to an unnamed manuscript, narrates a
hagiographical story in a footnote in his translation of Azād Bilgrāmi’s Rawẓatu’l
awliyāʾ about Bībī Hājara experiencing unusual signs while pregnant with
Muntajibu’d-Dīn. A pious man interpreted these experiences to her husband,

175 Rawẓatu’l-aqṭāb, p. 43. For a brief account of Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb, see Rizvi, A History of
Sufism, Vol. 1, p. 183.
176 Muḥammad Wāḥid Khān. 1913. Chār Chaman Khuldābād Sharīf ma‌ʾ naqshājāt. Maṭbaʿ
Abu’lʿalāiʾ Hyderabad, Deccan, p. 6.
177 Rawẓatu’l-aqṭāb, p. 43; also, Chār Chaman Khuldābād Sharīf ma‌ʾ naqshājāt, p., p. 3.
178 Her other brother was Shaikh Jamālu’d-Dīn Aḥmad Hāṅswī (628/1230–700/1300), a favou-
rite disciple of Shaikh Faridu’d-Dīn.
179 Muḥammad Wāḥid Khān. 1913. Chār Chaman Khuldābād Sharīf maʿ naqshājāt. Maṭbaʿ
Abu’lʿalāiʾHyderabad, Deccan, pp. 6–7.
372 Chapter 10

Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Maḥmūd Hāṅswī, as an omen of the birth of a virtuous son of

extraordinary merit who would be the chosen one of Allāh and His Prophet. A
more miraculous experience of Bībī Hājara, also reported in the same footnote,
relates that when the time of delivery approached, a voice came from within,
telling her that he (the baby) would not enter this world without satr-i tah-
mad (covering for the “zone of shame”). She then was made to swallow a piece
of fabric wrapped round jaggery. The baby, Muntajibu’d-Dīn, who earned the
epithet of Zar Zarī Zar Bakhsh, was then born covered by fabric with golden
stripes.180
As a loving and caring mother, she wanted to see her son Shaikh Burhānu’d-
Dīn Gharīb married and have his own family. This son, however, was so
engrossed in remembering Allāh that he had no time or inclination for mar-
riage. As he did not want to hurt his mother or be disrespectful towards her
motherly affection and care, he reduced his meals further. This lack of nutri-
tion made him so frail and weak that he could hardly turn his face upwards
to look at the sky. Bībī Hājara knew the inner spiritual power of her son and,
therefore, instead of insisting on marriage, she stepped back and let her son
pursue his path of seeking Allāh’s love.181
Bībī Hājara’s tomb is next to the shrine of her son with Muntajibu’d-Dīn
Zar Zarī Zar-Bakhsh outside the city of Khuldabad (Maharashtra) built on the
north side of the Hoda Hill.

(3)
Bībī Jīū/ Jī
Period: Fifteenth Century
Place: Bībīpura, Ahmadabad, Gujarat, India
ʿUrs: 4 Jamādiʿus Sānī

Similar to several other women of saintly virtues who remain hidden in the
narratives of their male Sufis and pious relatives, no separate account of Bībī
Jīū182 is found in contemporary chronicles. Mirāt-i Aḥmadi (The mirror of
Aḥmad), a mid-eighteenth-century history of Gujarat written in Persian by

180 Muḥammad ʿAbdu’l Majīd, Rawẓatu’l awliya‌ʾ al-maʿrūf Nafahātu’l Asfiyā. Hyderabad:
Maṭbaʿ-i Karīmī (1345/1926), p. 49, f. n. 1.
181 Mīr Ghulām ʿAlī Ᾱzād Bilgramī. 1310/1892. Rawẓatu’l Awliyāʾ. Maṭbaʿ ʿIjāz Ṣafdarī, p. 5.
182 English translation of Mirāt-i-Aḥmadī has misread her name as Bībī Ḥassu. See Syed
Nawab Ali and C.N. Seddon. 1928. Mirat-i Aḥmadī. Supplement. Gaekwad’s Oriental Series.
No. XL111. Baroda: Oriental Institute, p. 58.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 373

ʿAlī Muḥammad Khan,183 is the only source about the life of Bībī Jīū.184 This
account of Bībī Jīū, too, is not given separately. The narrative about her son,
Saiyyid Khwānd Mīr ʿArīzī, a Chishtī Sufi (d. 874/1469) who lies buried in
Pattan, Naharwala, contains references about Bībī Jīū.
Ḥaẓrat Khwānd Mīr, son of Saiyyid Buddā son of Saiyyid Yaʿqūb, was the
khalīfa of his paternal uncle, Saiyyid Shādī son of Yaʿqūb, son of Saiyyid
Muḥammad Kabīr, brother of Saiyyid Ḥusain khang suwār (rider of white/grey
horse).185 Khwānd Mīr’s mother, Bībī Jīū, also belonged to a family with Sufi
leanings. Her father, according to Mirāt-i Aḥmadi, was one of the ṣulaḥā wa
ṣāḥib-i taqwā (pious and God-fearing persons).186 Mirāt-i Aḥmadī’s statement
that Bībī Jīū’s mother, daughter of one named Maulānā Ẓiyāʾ, was Mughlai᾽ būd
could mean either she was of Mughal descent or one who came from some
Central Asian state.187
Regarding the excellent spiritual qualities and piety, ʿAlī Muḥammad Khan
writes that she was one of those who had fear of Allāh and was chaste and
innocent (ṣāḥib-i-wara᾽ wa ʿiṣmat wa ʿiffat). She had acquired great bless-
ings from the persons of excellent virtues (niʿmat az buzurgān dasht). Little
is known about her personal life. Bībī Jīū was married to Saiyyid Budda who
died early. The couple probably had only one child. So great was her devotion
to Allāh that during his infancy when her son Ḥaẓrat Khwānd Mīr desired to
be nursed, she would first perform fresh ablution to offer optional prayers
each time before breast-feeding him (Bībī Jīū tajdīd-i waẓū namūda dogānā
adā mīkard). As her motherly instincts were secondary to her devotion and
love for the Divine, she would supplicate to Allāh that “if the child is one of
Thy devotees, protect him, otherwise take away his life (ba-dargāh manajāt mī
khwāst ilāhī īṅ pisar agar yak-i-az sitūdgān tū bashad nigāhdārī wa illā khāk īṅ
ʿazīz gardān).” As her husband passed away when Ḥaẓrat Khwānd Mīr was just

183 ʿAlī Muḥammad Khan, the author of this valuable source, was the Diwan or the revenue
minister of the province of Gujarat. He completed the work between 1750 and 1760. For
his short biographical notice, see Syed Nawab Ali and C.N. Seddon. 1928. Mirat-i Ahmadi.
Supplement. Gaekwad’s Oriental Series. No. XL111. Baroda: Oriental Institute, pp. xi–xii.
184 ʿAli Muḥammad Khan. 1306/1889. Mirāt-i Aḥmadi- jild sānī. Bombay: Maṭbaʿ Fathu’l
Karīm, pp. 42–43.
185 Saiyyid Ḥusain khang suwār also known as Mīrāṅ Ṣāḥib is buried in Taragarh, Ajmer.
Emperor Akbar after his conquest of Gujarat, visited Ajmer to pay his homage to the
shrine of Khwāja Muʿīnu’d-Din Chishtī on 12 Rabiu’l awwal 980/1572. The next day, he
visited Saiyyid Ḥusain Khang’s grave and performed circumambulation. See ʿAbdu’l Qādir
Badaoni. Muntakhab-ut-Tawārīkh, vol. 2 (Translated by W.H. Lowe, Calcutta, Baptist
Mission Press, 1884), p. 143.
186 Mirat-i Aḥmadi- jild sānī, p. 42.
187 Ibid, p. 42.
374 Chapter 10

two and a half years of age, she was the only parent left to look after her son.188
Soon, Khwānd Mīr came under the spiritual training of his uncle, Saiyyid
Shādī, who perfected him in external and internal knowledge (zāhir u bāṭin
ārāsta). The uncle appointed him as his khalīfa at the young age of eleven and
soon passed away. As relations with his other uncle grew tense, Ḥaẓrat Khwānd
Mīr, on the advice of Makhdūm Saiyyid Ḥusain, moved to Ahmadabad along
with his widowed mother, Bībī Jīū.
Though the date of birth of Ḥaẓrat Khwānd Mīr is not found anywhere,
Commissariat says that he was twelve years of age when he arrived in
Ahmadabad from Pattan.189 In Ahmadabad, Ḥaẓrat Khwānd Mīr received the
blessings of the spiritual guidance (niʿmat) of Ḥaẓrat Saiyyid Burhānu’d-Dīn
Quṭb-i-ʿĀlam190 and instructions (talqīn) from Shaikh ʿAbdu’l Fatḥ.191 Soon he
was married in Ahmadabad and won the respect and following of men of influ-
ence in Gujarat’s power hierarchy. Of these, one was Malik Shʿabān,192 wazīr
of Sultan Aḥmad (r. 1451–1457), who had great faith (ʿitiqād tamām dāsht) in
Ḥaẓrat Khwānd Mīr.
Malik Shʿabān, being busy with his important state responsibilities (ba-sabab
ashghāl umūr-i mumālik iltizām), could not present himself before Ḥaẓrat
Khwānd Mīr every day, so he directed his son Malik Khushbāsh193 to remain in
attendance every day to seek his blessings. More than Malik Shʿabān’s devotion
for Ḥaẓrat Khwānd Mīr is the recognition of his righteousness and spiritual
attainments by his mother. Bībī Jīū became a disciple of her son by taking an
oath of allegiance (baʿit pisr-i khud darad).194
Bībī Jīū must have reached old age by now as one day she told her son to ask
Malik Khushbāsh to convey to Malik Shʿabān of her desire for a piece of land
for her burial place (maqbara). Malik Khushbāsh offered the mausoleum that

188 Ibid, p. 42.

189 M.S. Commissariat. 1938. A History of Gujerat. Including a Survey of its Chief Architectural
Monuments and Inscriptions. Vol. 1. Bombay: Longmans, Green & Co., p. 160.
190 Quṭb-i-ʿĀlam was the grandson of Makhdūm Jahāṅiyaṅ Jahāṅgasht (1308–1384) and was
brought up by his uncle, Rājū Qattāl who sent him to Pattan, Gujarat, in 802/1400, along
with his mother Bībī Hājara, known as Saʿādat Khatūn. He passed away in 857/1453.
191 Mirat-i Aḥmadi- jild sānī, p. 42.
192 Malik Shʿabān (d. 866/1461), son of Tuḥfa Sulṭānī, was a man with spiritual leanings.
Giving up his position of power, after a plot against him, of which he was honourably
absolved, he became a religious recluse and never stepped out of the superb garden he
had built at Rakhyal, Ahmadabad and died there shortly after.
193 Mirat-i Ahmadi. Supplement translates it as son-in-law, see p. 58. Similarly, Abu Zafar
Nadwi translates it as matabannā (adopted), see Nadwi, Abu Zafar. 1934. Tārīkh Awliya-i
Gujarat (tarjumā Mirāt-i Aḥmadi). Lahore: Himāyat-i Islam Press, p. 85.
194 Mirat-i Aḥmadi- jild sānī, p. 42.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 375

he had constructed for himself. Ḥaẓrat Bībī Ṣaḥiba, riding a bullock (bar bail
suwār shudā, perhaps a bullock driven vehicle), arrived there and, smelling the
dust of the place, said, “this is my place” (īṅ jā man ast). She also added that
whichever of the two (Bībī Jīū or Malik Shʿabān) died first would be buried first
in this place. As Malik Shʿabān died first, he was buried there.
Bībī Jīū passed away on 4 Jamādīʾus Sānī (the year is not mentioned) and
lies buried in her shrine in Bībīpura, Ahmadabad.195 Her son, who died later,
in 1469, is also buried in the same shrine.
Mirāt-i Aḥmadi, narrating the esoteric virtues of Bībī Jīū, gives an incredible
anecdote. Once she gave a gold coin (ashrafī) to her pious father to buy a robe
( jāma) from the market. It so happened that this gold coin slipped from his
hand somewhere in the market. When he searched for it, instead of one, he
saw two gold coins lying there in dust. He left both under the dust and returned
home. When enquired about the robe by Bībī Jīū, he told her that he left the
coin there, as he wondered whether it might belong to someone else. Bībī Jīū,
pointing towards the niche in the wall, said, “When it fell down from your
hands, instantly it came back to me” (chūṅ az dast uftādah būd filḥāl pesh-i
man amad).196
An imposing mosque was built in the memory of Bībī Jī by Sultan Abu
Muzaffar Aḥmad Shāh of Gujarat in the suburbs of Rajpur.197 The follow-
ing inscription on its central miḥrāb in the Persian language establishes its
historicity:

This noble Jami Masjid (hāzā al masjid al jam ʿal rafīʿ) “mistress of the
world” [name of the mosque] (makhdūmat jahān) was built by the great
sultan (Sulṭānu’l ʿAzam) Quṭbu’d dunyā wa Dīn Abu᾽l Muzaffar Aḥmad
Shāh, son of Muḥammad Shāh, son of Aḥmad Shāh, son of Muḥammad
Shāh, son of Muzaffar, the sultan; and the Hijra date of the mosque is
Rabiʿ u’l ākhir in the year eight hundred fifty-eight (April 1454).198

195 Bībīpura is the old name of Rajpur-Hirpur, a suburb where Malik Shʿabān had built gar-
dens and other superb buildings.
196 Mirat-i Aḥmadi- jild sānī, p. 43.
197 M.S. Commissariat. 1938. A History of Gujerat. Including a Survey of its Chief Architectural
Monuments and Inscriptions. Vol. 1, p. 159.
198 James Burgess. 1885. Lists of Antiquarian Remains in the Bombay Presidency: With an
Appendix of Inscriptions from Gujarat. Bombay: The Government Central Press, p. 246.
Burgess, however, has mistakenly identified Bībī Jī as the daughter of ‘Sayyid Khund Mir,
and wife of Sayyid Buda Sahib’.
376 Chapter 10

Interestingly, the above translation by Burgess changes totally when in 1941

another scholar, Chaghtai, read the word man in the inscription translated by
Burgess as umm, meaning mother. Thus, according to Chaghtai the mosque’s
name was not makhdūmat jahān but that it was built by Makhdūma Jahān,
the Sultan’s mother, who had built several other significant buildings includ-
ing her own mausoleum while still alive.199 Chaghtai also says that some even
alleged that the mosque was built by Saiyyid Buddha bin Yaʿqūb, Bībī Jī’s/ Bībī
Jīū’s husband.200 We know that she was widowed early and therefore the con-
struction by her husband could not be possible. A far more significant legacy
than the architectural remains and monuments that this noble Sufi woman
left behind was her grandson, Saiyyid Yaʿqūb Chishtī, son of Saiyyid Khwānd
Mīr. Saiyyid Yaʿqūb Chishtī (d. 1521) was a Sufi with excellent virtues ( jamīʿ ṣifāt
ārāsta) who earned the reverence of all.201
Abdul Jabbār Khan Mulkapurī in 1912, without acknowledging the original
source (ʿAlī Muḥammad Khan’s Mirāt-i Aḥmadi), reproduced the brief account
of Bībī Jīū’s life.202 More research might uncover several missing aspects of Bībī
Jīū’s story.

(4)
Bībī Khunza (also spelt Khunjā) Sulṭāna
Period: Fifteenth Century
Shrine: Gulbarga Sharīf, Karnataka, India
ʿUrs: 27 Rajabu’l murajjab

Bībī Khunza Sulṭāna was a remarkable person of excellent piety, with ascetic
qualities of self-denial and staunch devotion. Bashīruddīn Aḥmad rightly
describes her as ṣāḥib-i kashf wa karamāt (master of gnostic and miraculous
powers).203 On the Shrirangapattana-Bidar state highway near Kapnur stands
a sublime, square-shaped, domed mausoleum on an elevated square platform.
Built in the fifteenth century, the vaulted chambers of this funerary monument
contain several graves of the Sufis, the most famous being that of Bībī Khunza
Sulṭāna.
Bībī Khunza Sulṭāna was born with a silver spoon in her mouth, being
the daughter of Sulṭān Maḥmūd Bahmani. No detailed reference about this

199 Chaghtai, M. Abdulla. 1942. Muslim Monuments Through Their Inscriptions. Poona: Deccan
College Research Institute, p. 132.
200 Ibid, p. 131.
201 Mirāt-i Aḥmadī- jild sānī, p. 43.
202 Maḥbūbzil-manan-Tazkira Awliyāʾ-yi dakan, pp. 316–18.
203 Wāqiʿāt-i Mumlakat-i Bījāpūr (ḥiṣṣā som), p. 537.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 377

pious and righteous woman, whose ʿurs is celebrated each year on 27 Rajab
in Gulbarga, could be found in the Sufi narratives. Bashīruddīn Aḥmad’s
Wāqiʿāt-i Mumlakat-i Bījāpūr, written in 1915, gives some information about
her. Another source, Armughān-i Sulṭānī al-maʿrūf sair-i Gulbarga, written in
Urdu by Maulawī Muḥammad Sulṭān, adds more details.204 Born as a princess,
being the daughter of Sulṭān Maḥmūd Bahmani (r. 1378–1397) of the Deccan,
she later performed baiʿat at the hands of Ḥaẓrat Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī
(1276–1356). She chose poverty over riches.
Her husband was Ḥaẓrat Shams ul-ʿUshshāq alias Mīrāṅ Ḥusainī (d. 1499), one
of the most reknowned holy persons of the Deccan. In Sadluga, a small admin-
istrative unit of taluk Hukeri, is his magnificent shrine. Haẓrat Shamsu’d-Dīn,
alias Khwāja Shamnā Mīrāṅ (d. 798/1395), a person of piety and a master of
gnostic and miracles, was born of her. He was the successor of Ḥaẓrat Zain
al-Ḥaqq Shirāzī and battled with the infidels. His shrine is in Miraj, Murtaẓābād
(near Sangli, now in Maharashtra).205
These facts create more questions about Bībī Khunza Sulṭāna, or Bībī Kamāla,
as she is popularly known till today. Her name does not occur in the narratives
about Shams ul-ʿUshshāq, alias Mīrāṅ Ḥusainī. Maulawī Muḥammad Sultan’s
statement that Bībī Khunza Sulṭāna was the daughter of Sulṭān Maḥmūd
Bahmani is not found anywhere else.206
My search for more information about Bībī Khunza Sulṭāna led me to at
least two Facebook pages. I communicated with one of the two,207 whose
administrator provided me with the following information, which I translate
from Urdu here:

The dargāh’s name is Haẓratha Kamāla Bī Sulṭāna, may Allāh Bless her,
and popularly known as Khunja Ma Saḥiba, which is her appellation. This
appellation was conferred upon her by Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Bandā Nawāz Gīsū
Darāz, may Allāh Bless him. Khunjā means a bunch of keys. This appel-
lation was given to her because none of the walis of the Deccan could do
anything without [seeking] her permission.

204 Armughān-i Sulṭānī al-maʿrūf sair-i Gulbarga, pp. 182–33.

205 The shrine of Mīrāṅ Ḥusainī (d. Rajab 21, 792/ July 4, 1390) attracts mentally ill per-
sons and those possessed by spirits. See Armughān-i Sulṭānī, p. 183. For more informa-
tion, see Johannes Quack, ‘Possession and the Anti-Superstition Law in Maharashtra:
Disenchantment,’ in The Law of Possession—Ritual, Healing and the Secular State (Edited)
William Sax and Helen Basu. (pp. 138–161). New York: OUP, 2015.
206 Armughān-i Sulṭānī, p. 182.
207 Dargah Khunja Maa Saheba (Gulbarga) https://www.facebook.com/dargahkunja
.maasaheba.
378 Chapter 10

For the last 620 years, her ʿurs celebrations are held on the twenty-seventh
of Rajabu’l-Murajjab, the seventh lunar month of the Hijri calendar. Each
ʿurs is carefully managed and executed by the Dargāh Managing Committee,
which is an all-male body. The ʿurs, attended by thousands of men and women
devotees, begins with the Sandal ceremony (smearing the shrine with saf-
fron paste); on day two charāghāṇ (lighting of lamps) is held; the ʿurs ends on
day three with the ziyārat ceremony (visitation). On these three days, several
other events are also held, such as continuous and complete recitation of the
Qur’ān (khatm-i Qurʾān) by the devotees, naʿat recitations, placing of the floral
wreaths (phūloṅ ki chādar) at her grave, lectures by religious scholars, qawwāli,
and wrestling matches.
Local legends say that the water of the well, situated in the dargāh complex,
has healing powers for patients suffering from dog bites. Bashīruddīn Aḥmad
relates an incident of the Bībī’s miraculous powers, which happened during
his time. According to this story, a government employee riding his horse came
to visit the shrine. He tied his horse outside and entered the shrine to offer his
respects. As torrential rain with lightning began, the horse got frightened and
ran away. When told by his servant that the horse had run away, the horse rider
said, “Let it be. I came riding [the horse], now if the Bībī Sāḥiba wishes to send
me back on foot, I would do so.” He came out to leave and, to his surprise, saw
that the horse had returned.208 The dargāh Bībī Khunza Sulṭāna is included in
the list of waqf grants of the state of Karanatak. In 2010–2011, it received a grant
of 100,000 Indian rupees.209

(5)
Mother of Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Bāqī Billah
Period: Late Fourteenth–Early Fifteenth Century
Place: Delhi, India

Not much has been recorded about the mother of Khwāja Bāqī Billah
(d. 1012/1603) who introduced the Naqshbandī Sufi silsila in Hindustan.
Though much has been written about Khwāja Bāqī Billah, information about
his mother, who left a great mark on his life, is scanty. Even Khwāja Bāqī Billah,
who wrote paying homage to his mother, did not identify her by her name.

208 Wāqiʿāt-i Mumlakat-i Bījāpūr, p. 537; Armughān-i Sulṭānī, pp. 182–83.

209 2010–11 Details of grants/loans/expenditure to Autonomous Bodies.
karwakf.org/Grant’s%20List-10-11-12.pdf; also THE KARNATAKA STATE BOARD OF
WAKFS www.karwakf.org/…/Entry%20of%20measurement%20of%20wakf%20properties%2.
THE KARNATAKA STATE BOARD OF WAKFS. OFFICE OF …… Gulbarga Darga
Hazrat Khunza Maa Saheba …… 302 Gulbarga Darga Bibi Lashker bi (Sunni).
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 379

What we gather from scattered references is that she belonged to a fam-

ily of Sufis and scholars. Her father, Shaikh ʿUmar Yaghestani, was the mater-
nal grandfather of Khwāja Ubaidullah Aḥrār (d. 855/1490) of the Naqshbandī
Sufi silsila. Her mother was a Saiyyid by lineage. She was married to Qāẓī
ʿAbduṣ᾽Salām Khaljī Samarqandī Qureshī, a scholar with a deep interest in
mysticism (sāḥib-i wajd wa ḥāl).210 The marriage probably took place some-
time before 1563 in Kabul.211 Nothing further is known about her married life
or about her husband.
Perhaps she travelled with her son, Khwāja Bāqī Billah, from Kabul to Lahore
and then finally settled in Delhi in 1599. A reference to her piety, fear of Allāh,
and devotion towards serving Allāh’s creatures is found in Zubdatu’l-Muqamāt,
an account of the Naqshbandīyya Sufis by Khwāja Hāshim Kishmī (d. 1643), a
Naqshbandī Sufi and a disciple of Mujaddid-i Alf-i Sānī, compiled in 1037/1627–
1628, during the period of Emperor Jahangir. Ḥāshim Kishmī, without identi-
fying Bāqī Billah’s mother by name, based on what he had heard from some
reliable sources, writes that she was one of the qānitāt wa ṣāliḥāt (obedient
and devout) persons. So great was her piety that though she had several maid-
servants and female servants working for her, she took it upon herself to cook
and prepare meals and serve them to the fuqarāʾ (dervishes). So deep was her
devotion for the Sufis and so great was her humility that she used to bake the
bread in a clay oven with her own hands. Often, in the end, she would par-
take of whatever was left over, often just a piece or two of dried bread. Seeing
his mother’s infirmity and diminishing energies, probably because of aging,
Khwāja Bāqī Billah entrusted the work of cooking to some Sufis. Hearing
this, the pious mother began to weep and cry (giryā-o- zārī), saying that she
did not know what mistakes she had committed (kudām jarīma būd) which
caused her deprivation of this blessing (saʿādat) of serving the fuqarāʾ. Some
time passed by, and because of her wisdom, sagacity, sincerity, and disciple-
ship, which were considered her noble traits (dānāʾī wa zīrakī wa ghalba nisbat
ikhlās wa murīdī ki markūz jauhar sahrīf īshān ast), she did not say anything.
The Khwāja, however, came to know of his mother’s grieving condition and
let her once again take the responsibility of cooking the meals.212 However, he

210 Badru’d-Dīn ibn Muḥammad Ibrāhīm Sirhindī. 2010. Ḥaẓarātʾul-quds- daftar awwal (Urdu
translation by Ḥāfiz Muḥammad Ashraf. Lahore: Qādirī Rizvi Kutubkhana), p. 265.
211 Khwāja Muḥammad Hāshim Kishmī, Zubdatu’l-Muqāmāt. Kanpur: Maṭbaʿ Munshī Nawal
Kishore, 1890. All references and translations in this work are from its Urdu translation by
Ghulām Mustafa Khan and Maulānā Abul Fath Ṣaghīru’d-Dīn. Maṭba‌ʾ Nuʿmānia, Sialkot,
1407/1987, p. 34.
212 Bāqī Billah Dihlawī, Khwāja Muḥammad, Abū al-Ḥasan Zīd Fārūqī Ṣāhib Naqshbandī
Mujaddidī, and Burhan Ahmad Faruqi. 1967. Kullīyāt-i Bāqī Billah, yaʿnī, Majmūʿa -i kalām
380 Chapter 10

asked his brother-in-law Muḥammad Ṣādiq’s wife, Bībī Bānu, to assist her in
meal preparation. He also directed Bībī Āghā, the wife of one of his disciples,
Shaikh Muḥammad Ṣiddique, to prepare dough for bread (khamīr) and to help
her in general.213
Besides Hāshim Kishmī, Badru’d-Dīn Sirhindi, a khalīfā of Mujaddid-i
Alf-i Sānī, who compiled the biographies of the Naqshbandīyya Sufis in
Ḥaẓarātu’l-quds in 1053/1643, also refers to the saintly virtues of Khwāja Bāqī
Billah’s mother and confirms the details as given in Zubdatu’l-Muqāmāt.
Khwāja Bāqī Billah, recalling his early days, told the author how his mother
used to pray with tears in her eyes for his son to attain what he was striving
for—spirituality and Divine Blessings. He also said that all his success and his
status were due to his mother’s prayers.214
She is lying buried close to the grave of her son in old Delhi near the Lahorī
Gate off the Quṭb Road. Writing in 1964, Abū al-Ḥasan Zīd Fāruqi Ṣāhib
Naqshbandī Mujaddidī and Burhan Ahmad Faruqi found both the shrines in
dilapidated condition.215

(6)
Bībī Qarsum Khātūn
Period: Thirteenth Century
Place: Ajodhan (Punjab), Pakistan

Bībī Qarsum Khātūn was the mother of Shaikh Faridu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar
and Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn Mutāwakkil. Nizami’s words go undisputed, that
“Bābā Farīd’s first teacher whose influence was lasting on him was his mother.”216
Indeed, Bībī Qarsum Khātūn is one of those rare persons whose story is not a
story of one single person; she left a trail followed by several individuals, each
being an exemplary person. Except a few anecdotal references repeated in
contemporary texts with no dates, the life of this illustrious woman, an epit-
ome of Sufi ṭarīqa, remains mostly veiled. Most of our information about her

wa rasāil wa malfūzāt wa maktūbāt. Lahore: Malik Dīn Muḥammad and Sons, p. 57; also,
Ḥayāt-i Bāqiyya. Compiled & translated in Urdu by Ḥāfiz Muḥammad Raḥīm Bakhsh
Dihlawī. Dihlī: Afẓal al-maṭāb῾, 1905, pp. 82–83. Zubdatu’l-Muqāmāt, p. 34.
213 Ḥayāt-i Bāqiyya. Compiled & translated in Urdu by Ḥāfiz Muḥammad Raḥīm Bakhsh
Dihalwī. Dihlī: Afẓal al-maṭāb῾, 1905, pp. 82–83.
214 Ḥazarāt al-quds- daftar awwal, pp. 266, 276; Nasim Ahmad Faridi Amrohi 1978. Tazkira
Khwāja Bāqi Billah maʿ ṣāḥibzadagān wa khulafāʾ. Lucknow: Kutubkhana al-Furqān,
pp. 11–12.
215 Kullīyāt-i Bāqī Billah, yaʿnī, Majmūʿa-i kalām wa rasāil wa malfūzāt wa maktūbāt., pp. 15–16.
216 Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 1955. The Life and Times of Shaikh Farīd-u’d-Dīn Ganj-i-Shakar.
Aligarh: Dept. of History, Muslim University, p. 15.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 381

comes from Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Din Awliyāʾ’s Fawa‌ʾidu’l-fuʾād, the most authen-

tic source in the history of South Asian Sufism. Constructing her life story, how-
ever, the quintessential evidence of her saintly qualities comes not from the
spoken word or textual sources. Her children and grandchildren, whom she
nurtured and trained with exemplary virtues of zuhd (renunciation), taqwā
(piety), ṣabr (patience), and faqr (poverty), are the most authentic sources
of knowledge about her. She was not only a pious woman but had the rare
distinction of having three sons, two of whom, Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Masʿūd
Ganj-i Shakkar (1175 or 1176–1265) and Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn Mutawakkil (1164–
1273),217 have left behind an increasing circle of Chishtī Sufis, spread through-
out the landscape of South Asia and beyond. She also had the unique honour
of being the grandmother of three saintly and devoted women, the daughters
of Bābā Farīd—Bībī Mastūra, Bībī Sharīfa, and Bībī Fāṭima. The second one,
Bībī Sharīfa, possessed all the characteristics that in the estimation of the
Bābā Farīd were quintessential for the rank of a Sufi khalifā. Further, if we
add the name of Bībī ʿĀʾisha of Khuldabad as another daughter of Bābā Farīd
and of Bībī ʿĀʾisha’s anonymous daughter, the number of her pious women
descendants increases further. Thus, the mystical credentials of Bībī Qarsum
Khātūn are highlighted by her guidance of her children to the path of asceti-
cism. Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ testified this in his discourse on the topic
of the greatness of Bābā Farīd and his family. When the conversation turned
towards the greatness (buzurgi) of Bābā Farīd’s mother, the Khwāja first com-
mented, “The goodness (ṣalāhiyyat) of mother and father strongly affect (qawī
asr) the children.”218
What makes the narrative of Bībī Qarsum Khātūn distinctive is that, like a
true murshid, she taught the basic lessons of tazkiyatu’l-nafs (purification of
the soul) to her sons, thus polishing their faculties for taṣawwuf.219 The way
she accomplished this task, without donning a Sufi khirqa or holding discourse
sessions at a khānqāh, is an index to what a Sufi woman experiences while
negotiating with a culture burdened with the weight of patriarchal norms.
Jawāhir-i Farīdī is the only source that identifies Bībī Qarsum Khātūn by
her name.220 Surprisingly, Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, while referring
to her as buzurg (excellent person), identifies her not by her name but as
Shaikh-i kabīr rā walidā (mother of the Great Shaikh). Perhaps this manner

217 For his short biography, see AA, pp. 62–61.

218 FF, Majlis 5, 17 Rabiu’l awwal, 714.
219 For the Qurʾānic concept of tazkiyat al-nafs, see ‘Purification of the Soul. The concept of
tazkiyat al-nafs in Islam,’ by Gavin Picken in his Spiritual purification in Islam: the life and
works of al-Muḥāsibī. (pp. 123–167). Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge (2000).
220 JF, 259.
382 Chapter 10

of avoiding her name was out of devotional courtesy. Illah Diyā Joyā, a con-
temporary of Emperor Aurangzeb, in his Risālā Siyaru’l Aqṭāb (completed in
1646–1647), identifies her name as Bībī Maryam Khātūn.221 Another hagiog-
raphy of the Ṣabirī-Chishtī silsila, Tawārīkh āin̄ a-yi taṣawwuf, not only gives
her name as Ḥaẓrat Maryam Khātūn but says that she was the daughter of
Saiyyid Muḥammad ʿAbdullah and was born on 28 Muḥarram 483/1090 in
Gujrat, Punjab, and died on Thursday, 3 Ramaẓān 585/1189, and that she was
buried in Kothewal.222 Kanzu᾽l Ansāb, a repository of genealogy of South Asian
Sufis, says that Bābā Farīd’s mother’s name was Jamīla who was the daughter
of Saiyyid Wajihu’d-Dīn Khijwandī whose ancestry is traced to Ḥaẓrat Jaʿfar
Ṣādiq.223
Bībī Qarsum’s father, Maulānā Wajihu’d-Dīn Khijwandī, an accomplished
scholar and a pious person whose ancestry is traced to Ḥaẓrat ʿAbbās bin
ʿAbdu’l Muṭṭalib, migrated to the vicinity of Multan from Kabul.224 Perhaps
Bībī Qarsum was born in Kothewal (Kothaywal),225 a town in Multan where
Bābā Farīd’s father, Qāzī Shuʿaib, was appointed as Qāzī. Qāzī Shuʿaib was
also a scion of the twelfth-century immigrants from Kabul to the Ghaznavid
Punjab.226 They later got married sometime before 1175, the year of the birth of
their second son, Farīdu’d-Dīn Masʿūd.
Jawāhir-i Farīdī narrates an anecdote of how Bībī Qarsum used to leave her
son Farīd alone in the woods for long periods of time to train him in the life of
a future Sufi. While combing the ruffled hair of Farīd after one such long trip
of ten years to the forest, the child cried out for pain. The anguished mother,
aghast at Farīd’s sensation of pain, said, “You have wasted your time and have
achieved nothing.” Bābā Farīd resumed his journeys in search of the Divine,
abstaining from food and sustaining himself by chewing a piece of wood to
satisfy his desire to eat.227 Again, on his return, the mother enquired about
his experience and again her comment was that he had wasted his time and

221 Allāh Diyā Joyā. 1906. Risāla Siyaru’l Aqṭāb (translated in Urdu by Muḥammad ʿAli Joyā.
Kanpur: Nawal Kishore), p. 146.
222 Muḥammad Farūq Ḥasan Ṣābirī. 1311/1893. Tawārīkh-i āin̄ a-yi taṣawwuf. Rampur: Maṭbaʿ
Ḥusainī. (Reprint Lahore: Muḥammad Sulṭān Ṣābirī, 1971), p. 459.
223 ῾Abdur Razzāq ʿAṭāʾ Ḥusain. 1302/1884. Kanzu’l Ansāb. Maṭbaʿ Ṣafdarī, pp. 67–8.
224 ʿAlī Aṣghar Chishtī, Jawāhir-i Farīdī. Lahore: Victoria Press, 1884, pp. 182–185; W. Begg. 1999.
The Big Five Sufis of India and Pakistan. New Delhi: Millat Book Centre, p. 53.
225 This small locality today is known as Chawali mashāʾikh. For its description, see “Journal
of Capt. Wade’s Voyage from Lodiana to Mithankot by the river Satlaj, on his Mission to
Lahor and Bahawalpur in 1832–33,” by Lieut. F. Mackeson in The Journal of the Asiatic
Society of Bengal, vol. V1, Part 1, No. 63 (March,1837), pp. 169–217, especially p. 193.
226 Jamālī, p. 32.
227 Capt. Wade reports that during his visit to the shrine of Bābā Farīd in Pakpatan, among
several other relics, he was shown this piece of wood and describes it as “a round flat piece
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 383

had learned nothing. It was only after his last wandering in the forest, the
time when he performed Chilla-i māʿkūs,228 that the pious mother applauded
his efforts.229
Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliya‌ʾ, who had great regard and respect for Bābā
Farīd’s mother, narrated a story about her spiritual excellence and charismatic
powers. Later, the story was also retold by Amīr Khwurd.230 According to this
story, one night while her family was asleep and she was doing her nightly vig-
ils (bāḥaqq mashghūl), a burglar entered the house. The moment he stepped
inside the house, he lost his eyesight (kor shud) because of the radiating aura
of Bībī Qarsum. He knew his loss of sight was not merely a physical impair-
ment; it was something supernatural. Frightened, the thief sought forgiveness
and called out for help and for the restoration of his eyesight, imploring that
whosoever was in the house, if it be a man, he was like his father and brother,
and if a woman she was like his mother and sister. Bībī Qarsum then prayed
for his eyesight and it was restored (wālida-i Shaikh Kabīr duʿā kard wa ō bīnā
shud). The thief ran out of (bāraft) the house. Next morning, the mother of
Bābā Farīd did not say anything about the last night’s incident (īṅ ḥikāyat pesh
hīch kas nā kushāyad). Soon the same man with a jar of curdled milk on his
head (sabū-i-jughrāt bar sar karda) returned with his family and related that
last night he entered the house with the intent of robbery (bā duzdi) but the
fear of a pious woman who was awake, blinded him (man az haibat-i-ō kor
shudam). He then added that because of her supplications, his eyesight was
restored, and therefore he had vowed not to steal any longer (bā duʿā i-ō chasm
yāftam wa man ʿahd aradam ki bʿād azīṅ duzdi nākunam). He begged for for-
giveness and, along with his family, entered into Islam. Thus, because of the
blessings of this woman-friend of Allāh, they all became Muslims (barkat-i āṅ
walīya hamā musulmān shudand).231 Muḥammad ʿAlī Aṣghar Chishtī adds that

of wood of the size and shape of an Indian’s bread or chapāti.” See Journal of Capt. Wade’s
Voyage, p. 192.
228 Chilla-i māʿkūs is an inverted chilla which requires the person ‘to tie a rope around his feet
and remain suspended in a well, head down, for forty days and nights, while both fasting
and praying’. Athar Abbas Rizvi. A History of Sufism, vol. 1, p. 140.
229 ʿAlī Aṣghar Chishtī, Jawāhir-i Farīdī. Lahore: Victoria Press, 1884, p. 184; Jamālī, p. 31, also
Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 1955. The Life and Times of Shaikh Farīd-u’d-Din Ganj-i-Shakkar.
Aligarh: Dept. of History, Muslim University, p. 24.
230 Jamālī, p. 88; This anecdote is also narrated by Badru’d-Dīn Isḥāq who was Bībī Qarsum’s
granddaughter’s husband in Faṣl 20 of his Asrāru’l awliyāʾ. Kanpur: Nawal Kishore, 1890,
p. 89. The malfūz of Khwajā Faridu’d-Dīn, however, is considered fake.
231 FF, Majlis 5, 17 Rabiʿ al-awwal, 714; Jamālī, p. 88; Jawāhir-i Farīdī, pp. 184–185; Akhbāru’l
Aṣfiyāʾ also repeats this story, see Shadma Shahzad. 2013. ‘A Critical Edition of Akhbar-
ul-Asfiya with Introduction and Notes.’ A thesis submitted for the award of Doctor of
Philosophy in Persian. Department of Persian, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, p. 311.
384 Chapter 10

this man, now named ʿAbdu’llah, turned into a pious person (sāliḥ) and served
well. He lies buried close to the tombs of Bābā Farīd’s father and elder brother,
῾Izzu’d-Dīn Maḥmūd.232 This story thus tells how, like a true Sufi, Bībī Qarsum
changed the life of a robber by night and a curd seller by day into a God-fearing
pious man and thus saved him from causing further harm to others.
Bībī Qarsum’s death, too, was a miraculous one. Indeed, Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ’s eyes were filled with tears (chashm pur āb kard) while recalling the
mysterious incident of her death. While travelling to Ajodhan with her sec-
ond son, Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn Mutāwakkil, through a forest, the mother and
son stopped to get some water to drink. Najību’d-Dīn left her under a tree and
went in search of water. Returning to the spot where he had left his mother,
Najību’d-Dīn was shocked to see her missing. As all efforts failed to find her,
the saddened son returned home to relate the woeful tale of the disappear-
ance of their exalted mother to Bābā Farīd. As customary, funeral prayers
were offered and food was distributed among the poor in charity. After some
time, once again Najību’d-Dīn happened to pass along the same route where
he had lost his mother. He looked around the same tree where he had left
her to wait for him and found some human bones (ustukhwān-i-ādmi) lying
around. Thinking that these must have been of his mother who might have
been mauled by a lion or some other man-eating animal, he put the bones
in a bag (dar kharīṭa andākht) and brought them to his brother, Bābā Farīd.
When the bag was opened, not a single bone was found in it. Narrating this,
Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn’s eyes were once again filled with tears.233 The story of
Bībī Qarsum, though full of gaps, remains inspirational for all.

(7)
Bībī Rāstī/ Pāk Mā’ī/Pāk Dāmnāṅ
Date: D. 695/1295
Shrine: Off Nishat Road, Basti Daira, Multan, Pakistan

Bībī Rāstī (the righteous one) was the mother of Shaikh Ruknu’d-Dīn Abu’l
Faṭh, known as Shaikh Rukn-i-ʿĀlam (Support of the world, d. 1335).234 She was

232 Jawāhir-i Farīd, p. 60; also see Jahān Ārāʾ Begum, Mūnisu’l-arwāḥ. 1638. Translated in Urdu
as Muʿīnu’l- arwāḥ by Maulawī Muḥammad ʿAbdus-Ṣamad Kalīm Qādirī. Dehli: Matbāʿ
Rizvi, (1891), p. 34.
233 Ibid, FF, Majlis 5, 17 Rabiʿu’l-awwal, 714; Jamālī, p. 88; Bībī Qarsum’s narrative is also
included in Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf’s late eighteenth-century Bahr-e-Zakhkhar (vol. 3),
p. 3763.
234 Jamālī, pp. 140–47; AA gives an account of the excellence of this saint. For details, see
pp. 65–68.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 385

also the daughter of Sultan Jamālu’d-Dīn of Farghana, a state in Central Asia,

and came to Hindustan along with her family. She was married to Makhdūm
Shaikh Ṣadru’d-Dīn ʿĀrif Qattāl (d. 1286),235 son of Shaikhu’l Islam Bahāʾud-Dīn
Zakarīyya (d. 1267),236 the founder of the Suhrawardī silsila of the Sufis in
South Asia. She became a disciple of her father-in-law, Shaikh Bahāu’d-Dīn
Zakarīyya.237 Ḥāmid Jamālī Kamboh (d. 1530), himself a Suhrawardī Sufi, in
Siyaru’l ʿᾹrifīn, a narrative of the Chishtī and Suhrawardī Sufis of India, writes
that Bībī Rāstī, being an embodiment of her name, in her uprightness and
modesty (dar rāstī wa durustī) was the Rābʿia of her times.238 Bahāʾud-din
Zakarīyya conferred upon her the title of Bībī Pākdāman (literally, the woman
with a holy scarf, or, metaphorically, the virtuous lady).
Another chronicler, Saiyyid ʿAbdul Qādir, about whom little is known,239
in his biographical compendium of the Sufis of Sindh, written in 1016/1607,

Figure 11 Shrine Bībī Rāstī also known as Pāk Mā’ī and as Pāk Dāmnāṅ, Multan

235 For his biographical notices, see AA, pp. 63–65.

236 For an account of his life, see AA, pp. 30–31.
237 Jamālī, p. 140.
238 Ibid, p. 140.
239 Nabi Hadi. 1995. Dictionary of Indo-Persian Literature. New Delhi: Indira Gandhi National
Centre for the Arts, p. 21.
386 Chapter 10

Figure 12 Ancestral history of Bībī Rāstī, Multan

Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 387

addresses her with honorific titles, such as ʿafīfā-i daurāṅ (the virtuous woman
of all ages), mukhaddarā-yi zamān (the concealed woman of her time),
tāju’lmukhaddarāt (crown of the veiled women),240 zainu’l mastūrāt (adorn-
ment of the hidden ones), ʿafīfā-yi āfāq (chaste woman of the heavens), and
maryam akhlāq ([one with] morals of Mary).241 It is worth noticing that despite
this admiration and adulation, Saiyyid ʿAbdul Qādir did not include a separate
account of Bībī Rāstī. The above eulogy falls in the account of her husband,
Makhdūm Shaikh Ṣadru’d-Dīn ʿĀrif Qattāl, and serves to extol the virtues of the
foetus she carried in her womb, i.e., Shaikh Rukn-i-ʿĀlam. ʿAbdullah Kheshgī, in
Maʿāriju’l wilāyat, completed in 1094/1683, repeats the same story and says that
she used to recite the whole Qurʾān each day.242
Indeed, her excellent virtues as a pious and abstinent person made her a
perfect friend of Allāh. Her devotion to the Qurʾān, which she had memorised,
was so great that each day she would recite the whole book.243 Jamālī writes
that while she was seven month pregnant with Shaikh Ruknu’d-Dīn Abu’l Faṭh,
on the evening of the fourteenth of lunar month she came to offer her saluta-
tion (salām) to her father-in-law and her spiritual mentor, Shaikh Bahāu’d-Dīn
Zakarīyya. The Shaikh stood up to greet her. As the Shaikh had not done this
before, she asked the reason for it. The Shaikh answered that he was paying
respect to the child she was carrying in her womb and who was the light of
his family (chirāgh-i khāndān).244 Legends say that she always fed her son,
Shaikh Rukn-i-ʿĀlam, whom she affectionately called Shāh Jalūlā, in a state of
complete purity, i.e., after performing waẓū. While feeding her baby, instead of
crooning a lullaby as is usually done by mothers, she would recite the Qur’ān to
him.245 So great was her spiritual influence that even her slave girls, instead of
singing folksongs, used to recite the Qurʾān while grinding away on the grind-
ing stone.246

240 For further meanings of the term mukhaddarā, see Marion Holmes Katz, Women in
Mosque. A History of Legal Thought and Social Practice. NY: Columbia University Press,
2014, pp. 108–8.
241 Saiyyid ʿAbdul Qādir. 1016/1607. Ḥadīqatʾul Awliyāʾ. Edited by Saiyyid Hisāmu’d-Dīn
Rashdi. Hyderabad: Sindi Adabi Board, 1967. pp. 22–23.
242 ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī. 1094/1683. Maʿāriju’l wilāyat, MS. No. R344, Iqbal Mujaddidī Collec-
tion, Punjab University, Lahore. Fol. 653b.
243 Jamālī, p. 140; Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyāʾ, jild dom, p. 424.
244 Jamālī, p. 141; Khazīnatu’l Asfiyā, p. 47.
245 Muḥammad Aulād ʿAlī Gīlānī. 1963. Awliyā-yi Multān Lahore: Sang-i Meel Publications,
pp. 233–34; Bashīr Ḥusain Nāzim. 2005. Awliyāʾ-yi Multan. Lahore: Sang-i Meel Publica-
tions, pp. 86–87.
246 Nūru’d-Dīn Khan Farīdī. 1977. Tārīkh -i Multān, vol. 1. Multan: Qaṣrul Adab, p. 228.
388 Chapter 10

Figure 13 Front view of Bībī Rāstī shrine, Multan

Figure 14 Another front view of Bībī Rāstī shrine, Multan

Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 389

Bībī Rāstī acted as a spiritual guide and mentor to women. Several women
benefitted from the teachings of the Suhrawardī sisila through her guidance.247
She left this world in 695/1295 and lies buried in Multan. Her shrine, a pro-
tected monument under the Auqaf Department and the Punjab Archaeology
Department, displays her ancestry (shajra-yi nasb). The inscription refers to
her as both Bībī Pākdāman and Bībī Rāstī. Translated in English, the inscrip-
tion says:

The Family Tree of Bībī Pāk Dāman

Bībī Rāstī, known as Bībī Pāk Dāman, princess of Farghana, arrived
from Madīna, the illuminated city. Daughter-in-law of Ḥaẓrat Ghaws-u’l
ʿĀlamīn Bahāu’l Ḥaqq Bahāu’d-Dīn Zakariyya, Allāh have Mercy upon
him. Wife of Ḥaẓrat Ṣadru’d-Dīn Muḥammad ʿĀrif Ba-Allāh, may Allāh
have Mercy upon him. Son is Ḥaẓrat Shāh Jalālū Ruknu’d-Dīn Rukn-i
ʿĀlam Nūrī Ḥuẓūrī, may Allāh have Mercy upon him. Father, the king
of the kings, Shāh Jamālu’d-Dīn of the kingdom of Farghana, arrived
from Madīna, the illuminated city, the First Khalifā, the ruler of Kuchch
Makrān. Sulṭānu’l Tārikīn, Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Ḥākim—
auspicious place of burial, Mau Mubarak, District and taḥsīl of Rahīmyār
Khan, teacher of Bībī Pāk Dāman is Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Tāju’d-Dīn Sulṭānu’l
Tārikīn, Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Ḥākim who is lying buried outside
this most holy shrine.
Sajjadānishīn- Makhdūm Shāh Maḥmūd Qureishi Asadī al-Hashimi
Suhrawardī.
Murīd: the dog-guard: the humble servant Ḥājī Ḥabīb Anwar Qureishi
al-Hashimi Suhrawardī, resident of Kot Shāhbāz, Rahim Yar Khan.

The brick-built entrance to the dargāh opens into a brick-paved open area
where on one side stands the oblong tomb structure of Bībī Rāstī with a flat
roof and arched wood-pillared veranda with two small cupolas standing at
the two front corners of the façade. In this veranda lie reposed several female
members of the Zakarīyya family. At one side of the veranda, a door leads into
the grave chamber of Bībī Rāstī.
ʿAbdullah Kheshgī, writing in the late seventeenth century, records that on
Thursdays when people assembled at her shrine to seek her blessings, men
were not allowed to enter the premises but prayed standing outside the wall;
women entered the shrine and prayed.248 On my visit, I noticed that males

247 Ḥadīqatʾul Awliyāʾ, p. 240; Rizvi, vol. 1, pp. 210–11.

248 ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī. 1094/1683. Maʿāriju’l wilāyat, MS. No. R344, Iqbal Mujaddidī Collec-
tion, Punjab University, Lahore. Fol. 653b.
390 Chapter 10

Figure 15 Women’s graves at the shrine of Bībī Rāstī, Multan

Figure 16 An anonymous woman’s grave in the courtyard of Bībī Rāstī shrine, Multan
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 391

were barred from entering the precincts of the shrine. The shrine is managed
by women attendants only. A notice on the outer wall allows men to walk up
only to the threshold (chaukhat) of the main shrine. Women devotees use the
water of the shrine’s well, with rose petals floating on its surface, for ablution.
It is believed that this water has healing power and cures infertility and barren-
ness. Petals are collected from the waters’ surface for making offerings at the
tomb. Large numbers of women visit the shrine, making supplications to the
Bībī, and tie shreds of coloured fabric and threads as symbols of their mannat
(vows). Some visitors tie these bands and rags to a window grill from outside.
On my visit to the shrine in February 2016, I met with several women devo-
tees present at the shrine. One newly married woman told me, main ḥāẓirī
denai ayi hun. Apni shādī par salām karne wastai aur yeh ki Allāh mujhe beta
dai (I present myself here to offer my respects after my marriage and to seek
through her the blessings of begetting a son as my first child). Accompanied by
her sister-in-law, she had brought rose petals, sweetmeats, and a small vessel
full of cooked rice and meat for distribution among the devotees present there.
The shrine of Bībī Rāstī is almost like history preserved through monu-
ments. Looking at the large number of graves within the covered area, marked
for women’s graves, some named and some unnamed, of which some are
centuries old and some from recent times, a sense of history overwhelms the
visitor. Walking through the graves, with some of the tombstones covered by
red- or green-coloured shiny fabric, I felt as if I was in the company of women
of the past and got a strange feeling of camaraderie. Portions of the struc-
ture are crumbling due to natural deterioration and human neglect. More
research is required to document the history of those who lie buried there. This
research needs to be undertaken now, before it gets too late and the evidence
is lost forever.

(8)
Bībī Sāra
Date: D. 638/1240
Shrine: Near Masjid kuhna, Delhi, India

Among the early Sufi travellers, including Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī (d. 1236)
and Khwāja Quṭbu’d-Dīn Bakhtiyār Kākī (d. 1235), who reached Hindustan was
also the family of Bībī Sāra. Bībī Sāra belonged to a scholarly and devout family.
Her son, Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad, a great scholar and Sufi, also
arrived during this time249 along with other male relatives, including Saiyyid

249 Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad (d. H 725/1325), a scholar of great merit with
miraculous powers, was a nephew of Amir-i Dihlī and Shaikhu’l Islam of Dihlī, Saiyyid
392 Chapter 10

Nūru’d-Dīn Mubārak Ghaznawī (d. 632/1234), a khalīfa of Shaikh Shihābu’d-Dīn

Suhrawardī and Bībī Sāra’s husband’s brother.250
Bībī Sāra lived in Delhi, or Dihlī as it was known then, which was in the
midst of far-reaching political and social changes under the rule of Sultan
Shamsu’d-Dīn Iltutmish (r. 1211–1236). With the Sultan’s death in 1236, Muslim
South Asia experienced the first public display of gender bias against women.
The accession of Sultan Shamsu’d-Dīn Iltutmish’s daughter, Raẓiya Sultan
(1236–1240), to the throne as his rightful heir resulted in her fall and death
which was orchestrated by male power holders. Probably it is because of this
prevalent social attitude towards women that contemporary accounts are
silent about the presence or absence of women who, like men, travelled to
Hindustan. One can assume that Bībī Sāra arrived in Delhi along with her son.
Fawāʾidu’l-fuʾād, the malfūz of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, which identi-
fies her not by name but by her familial relationship, records an incredible
anecdote of the charismatic powers of Bībī Sāra. We are not sure whether her
name was intentionally withheld by Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ as
a mark of respect for women, especially for mothers, or the omission was not
considered significant in the context of the narrative. Ḥasan Sijzi, in Fawāʾid
ul-fuʾād, records that in the session held on 11 Rajab 722/1322, Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ recalled that once, due to shortfall of rain, famine became imminent
(āghāz-i-qaḥṭ) in Delhi. At the request of the public of Delhi (khalq-i-shahr),
Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad stepped to the pulpit (miṅbar) and, tak-
ing out a piece of fabric from his sleeve, lifted it towards the sky and prayed
for rain. Soon rain came down heavily (qawī hāl). When asked about the
piece of fabric, Shaikh Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad said it was the scarf of his late mother
(dāman wālida-i man būd).251 It is also related that Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l
Mua‌ʾiyyad told someone that the piece of fabric which he had in his hands
while praying for rain belonged to Khwāja Quṭbu’d-Dīn Kākī who had gifted
it to Bībī Sāra, who always covered her head with that fabric while praying,
for added blessings.252 The relationship between the families of Bībī Sāra and

Nūru’d-Dīn Mubārak Ghaznawi (d. 1325). For more details, see, FF, Majlis 25, 15th Jamādiu’l
awwal, 711/1311; ʿAbdu᾽l-Ḥaqq Muḥaddis Dihlawī refers him as az mashāhīr buzurgān ast
(a renowned person among the saintly persons). His son Jamāl Kolvī was also a saintly
person. See, AA, p. 49.
250 For a notice on Saiyyid Nūru’d-Dīn Mubārak, see AA, p. 32.
251 FF, Majlis 31 of 11th Rajab, 722/1322.
252 Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf. Bahr-e-Zakhkhar. (Edited) Azarmi Dukht Safavi. 2012. Bahr-e-
Zakhkhar, Critical Edition with Introduction and Notes (vol. 3). Aligarh: Institute of Persian
Research, Aligarh Muslim University, p. 256; Sanāullāh Maḥmūd. 2006. Sāu baŕī zāḥid
khwatīn aūr un kī sardār Ḥaẓrat Fātima bint-i Muḥammad: Ummahātu’l muʾminīn, banāt-i
Rāsul, Ṣaḥābīyāt. Lahore: Baitul‘ulūm, pp. 480–82.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 393

Khwāja Quṭbu’d-Dīn Kākī was so close that the latter used to consider her son,
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad as his brother and guided him on his spiri-
tual path.253
Following Ḥasan Sijzi’s story, for the next four hundred years Bībī Sāra did
not appear in any other Sufi biographical collections. Shaikh ʿAbdu’l-Ḥaqq
Muḥaddis Dihlawī (d. 1642) added a four-line note about her under a section
titled “an account of some righteous women” (zikr bāʿz az nisāʾ-i ṣaliḥāt), at the
end of his seventeenth-century magnum opus compendium of more than three
hundred biographies of male Sufis, the Akhbāru’l akhyār fī asrāru’l-abrār. It is
significant to note that not only is she the first in the list of righteous women
included by Muḥaddis Dihlawī, as chronologically she qualifies for it, but she is
also identified by her name. He writes that Bībī Sāra belonged to saintly persons
of the past (mutaqaddimīn) and was a highly revered person (bisyār buzurg).
Muḥaddis Dihlawī repeats the miraculous tale as given in Fawāʾid ul-Fuād
showing the charismatic powers that even a thread of the garment worn by
Bībī Sāra held. Thus, the piece of fabric of the first narrative now turned into
a mere thread in Akhbāru’l akhyār, thus adding more weight to the miracu-
lous powers of Bībī Sāra. Filling in more details, Muḥaddis Dihlawī writes that
once when Delhi suffered from scarcity of rainfall (imsāk) and drought-like
conditions developed, people came to Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad,
Bībī Sāra’s son and beseeched him to pray for rain. Holding a thread of his
auspicious mother’s skirt in his hands (rishta az dāman-i mādar khud badast
girift), he invoked Allāh’s mercy by praying, “My Lord! Send down rain in hon-
our of the respected woman to whose scarf this thread belongs and on whom
stranger’s gaze never fell upon” (bāḥurmat-i āṅ ki īṅ rishta dāman-i ẓa‌ʾīfa ast ki
hargiz chashm-i nāmaḥram bārū niftātādah ast barān bafirast). As he uttered
these words, rain came down.254 This narrative is also mentioned in Asrāru’l
awliyā’, the alleged conversations of Khwajā Faridu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar (d.
1265) attributed to his disciple and son-in-law, Maulānā Badru’d-Dīn Isḥāq.
This malfūz, however, is considered fake and spurious.255
The above narrative, with slight variation of diction and not facts, is given in
another seventeenth-century source, Maʿāriju’l-Wilāyat, a biography of South
Asian Sufis written in 1094/1682 by ʿAbdullah Kheshgī.256 Bībī Sāra’s story
kept inspiring the scribes of Sufi biographies even further. Thus, Wajihu’d-Dīn

253 ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī. Maʿāriju’l-Wilāyat, MS. No. R344, Iqbal Mujaddidī Collection, Punjab
University, Lahore. Fol. B.
254 AA, p. 280.
255 Faṣl 19 in Badru’d-Dīn Isḥāq. Asrāru’l awliyāʿ. Kanpur: Nawal Kishore, 1890, p. 88.
256 Maʿāriju’l-Wilāyat, MS. No. R344, fol. 652, a & b.
394 Chapter 10

Ashraf in 1788–1789 pays his tributes to Bībī Sāra by addressing her as ʿārifā
kāmil (perfect gnostic) and ʿāshiq-i wāhīd (lover of the Only One [Allāh]), and
as having kamālāt-i fāʾīq (superb spiritual excellence).257
As medieval South Asian historical writings are a mix of facts and hagiog-
raphy, one can assume that in addition to Fawāʾid ul-fuʾād Muḥaddis Dihlawī
and other sources might have been based upon local traditions, which kept
alive Bībī Sāra’s memory. Akhbāru’l akhyār, however, gives no date of her
demise. Ghulām Sarwar Lahorī, without identifying his source, says that she
died in 638/1240, thus adding more historicity to Bībī Sāra’s account.258 Lahorī
also says that she had memorised the Qurʾān, used to fast frequently, and spent
her days and nights in remembering Allāh. Bībī Sāra’s scholarship and knowl-
edge of fiqh was so great that people used to listen to her with rapt attention.
The year Bībī Sāra passed away, Raẓiya Sultan also died.259 Thus, the nascent
Muslim community of South Asia suffered the loss of two notable women in
the same year, one from the mundane realm and the other of the spiritual
domain. Few know that Bībī Sāra reposes in her grave in Mehrauli, near Masjid
Kuhna, close to the shrine of Khwāja Quṭbu’d-Dīn Kaki.260 Thus, the long affec-
tionate relationship that the two had with each other—the Khwāja treated her
as his sister—continues.
In the above narrative, in addition to the saintly virtues of Bībī Sāra, some
other points emerge that help us significantly in the estimation of the time
she lived and in exemplifying male perception of Sufi women. The narrative
in Fawāʾidu’l-fuʾād gives the primary credit for the relief rainfall to Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad who was approached by the people to pray for
them. Only when the raindrops stopped after the first shower did Shaikh Abu’l
Mua‌ʾiyyad bring out Bībī Sāra’s scarf from his pocket. The woman in whose
name supplication was made remained veiled and hidden. In the seventeenth-
century narration of Muḥaddis Dihlawī, the story’s emphasis shifts to the
concept of women’s virtues allied to their veiling. Thus, Muḥaddis Dihlawī,
a scholar of Islamic jurisprudence with excellence in the knowledge of the
Prophet’s Traditions, declares that the core essence of Bībī Sāra’s spiritual vir-
tues was because a stranger’s gaze did not catch a glimpse of her face at all.
Later, around 1985, when Ḥasan Sānī Nizāmi, sajjāda-nishīn (spiritual succes-
sor) and nephew of the prolific Urdu author, journalist, and mystic Khwāja

257 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, p. 367.

258 Ḥadīqatʾul Awliyāʾ. p. 238.
259 Ṭabaqāt-i Nāṣirī, p. 812.
260 AA, p. 280; Ḥadīqatʾul Awliyāʾ, p. 238; Farīdī, Muḥammad ‘Ᾱlam Shāh. 1912. Mazārāt
awliyāʾ-i Dihlī (ḥiṣṣa awwal). Dihlī: Jān-i Jahaṅ Press, p. 76.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 395

Ḥasan Nizami, translated the Fawāʾidu’l-fuʾād into Urdu, he further changed

the direction of the above story of Bībī Sāra by adding a subtitle to the entry
of the thirty-first Majlis 11 Rajab 722/1322 in the table of contents. This head-
ing by describing it as Ḥazrat Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad kī buazargī
kai bārai main ḥikāyat (narrative about the magnificence of Ḥazrat Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Mua‌ʾiyyad) covers the story under another veil.

(9)
Bībī Zulaikhā
Date: D. 648/1250
Shrine: Delhi, India
ʿUrs: 29–30 Jamādīu’l-awwal
Place of ʿUrs Celebrations: Adchini near Mehrauli, Delhi

Bībī Zulaikhā’s life account comes to us through the most reliable spoken words
of her son, Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ (d. 1325) which were transcribed by
his loyal and trusted disciple Amīr Ḥasan Sijzi in Fawa‌ʾidu’l-fuʾād between
707/1308 and 722/1322.261 As the disciples and spiritual successors of Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ had a devotional regard and affection for the only par-
ent of their Shaikh, i.e., his mother, their tazkirāt and malfūzāt are also replete,
albeit repetitive in nature, with narratives about her. Thus, for reconstructing
the life of Bībī Zulaikhā, Fawa‌ʾidu’l-fuʾād remains the most authentic source.
Siyaru’l Awliyāʾ (Biographies of the Friends of God) of Saiyyid Muḥammad bin
Mubārak Kirmāni (known as Amīr Khwurd), which was composed around the
middle of the fourteenth century, is the second reliable source for informa-
tion about Bībī Zulaikhā’s life.262 Siyaru’l ʿᾹrifīn (Biographies of the Gnostics)
of Ḥāmid bin Faẓlu’llah Jamālī (d. 942/1536), written between 938/1531 and
941/1535, is another authentic source of information.263 It is interesting to note
that none of the contemporary sources nor any later ones offer any informa-
tion about Bībī Zulaikhā’s formal initiation into a Sufi silsila by entering into
baiʿat. This missing information is not because of wilful omission or sheer
neglect of details about the righteous women on the part of male scribes of
her story, including her son, Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ. Silence about for-
mal nonaffiliation of Bībī Zulaikhā’s path of Sufism thus abundantly illustrates

261 Amīr Ḥasan ʿAlā Sijzi Dihlawī. 1302/1885. Fawāʾidu’l-fuʾād. Lucknow: Munshi Nawal
Kishore.
262 Amīr Khwurd and his family had deep spiritual reverence for the Chishtīs. He was even
named as Muḥammad by Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ. See SA, pp. 356–57.
263 Ḥāmid Faẓlu’llah Jamālī.1310/1892. Siyaru’l ʿᾹrifīn. Dihlī: Maṭbaʿ Riẓvi.
396 Chapter 10

her intense servitude to God alone and to her unconditional submission to the
pleasure of God (riẓā). Later events of her life, as briefly described below, con-
firm her resolute trust (tawakkul) in God as follower of the path of taṣawwuf.
Bībī Zulaikhā’s father, Khwāja ʿArab, and his paternal cousin Khwāja ʿAlī,
who later became the Bībī’s father-in-law, escaped from their ancestral home
in Bukhara, which was ganj-i ʿilm wa kān-i taqwā (treasure house of learning
and a mine of piety and devotion)264 in the wake of the Mongol ravages in
Central Asia. Travelling through Lahore and Delhi, this émigré family made
Badayun, a small town in northern India where a sizeable Muslim community
already existed and was the Qubbatu’l Islam,265 their final destination.266 We
do not know how old Bībī Zulaikhā was at this time. The first reference we find
is that she was married in Badayun to Khwāja Aḥmad,267 son of Khwāja ʿAlī,
and was given dowry as was the tradition by her father.268 Khwāja ʿArab could
afford this expenditure as he was as man of means and possessed huge assets
and countless workers or slaves (māl bisyār wā bandagān beshumār) of whom
some earned money for him while some did business for him (bʿaẓ ba kasb wa
bʿaẓ ba-māl-i tijārat).269
In Badayun, Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn, the second child, was born (640–641/
1243–1244) to the couple. Married life proved short-lived. While Khwāja
Nizāmu’d-Dīn was an infant (ʿālam-i ṣughrā būd), Khwāja Aḥmad fell ill
(zaḥmat shud) and soon died.270 Amīr Khwurd says that while her hus-
band was approaching his death, Bībī Zulaikhā heard a voice in a dream to
choose (ikhtiyār kun) between her husband and her son.271 Muḥammad
Jamāl Qiwāmu’d-Dīn, one of the disciples of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ,
records more details of this dream in Qiwāmu’l-ʿaqā’id, a tazkira of Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ which he wrote in 755/1354 and which is based on

264 SA, p. 94.

265 The word qubba means a cupola, a dome, or a tent. Here it means a stronghold.
266 SA, p. 94; Jamālī in Siyaru’l ʿᾹrifīn says that the two families migrated from Ghazni, see
p. 59; Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. 2004. Sheikh Nizamuddin Awliya. New Delhi: National Book
Trust, p. 15; Khaliq Ahmad Nizami. Religion and Politics in India during the Thirteenth
Century. Bombay: Asia Publishing House, pp. 76–77.
267 Jamālī gives the name as Aḥmad bin Dānyāl, p. 59; also, see Shaikh Muḥammad
Raẓiu’d-Dīn Siddiqi Farshori Badayuni. 1318/1900. Tazkira wāṣilīn ( faṣl dom). Lucknow:
Munshi Gulab Singh & Sons, pp. 60–67.
268 SA, p. 95.
269 Ibid, p. 94.
270 Ibid, p. 95; Jamālī says that Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn was five years of age (dar waqt pānch
sālgi pirash az sar guzashta), p. 59. An Urdu work, Tazkira wāṣilīn (fasl dom) of Muḥammad
Raẓiu’d-Dīn Bismil Badayni, also gives the same age. See p. 60.
271 SA, p. 95.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 397

his personal observations.272 He writes that the voice in her dream told Bībī
Zulaikhā that the son she carried in her womb was one of the most revered
persons of faith, a benefactor and a friend of Allāh (buzurgān-i dīn wa ṣāḥib-i
niʿmat wa wilāyat ast). She chose her son because Allāh had shown her by His
Majesty ( jalāl) the Blessed status (darajāt-i saʿādat) of her son.273 After the
husband died, he was buried in Badayun.274 Devotees with great reverence vis-
ited his grave, until the time of the writing of Siyaru’l-Awliyāʾ.275
The young, widowed Bībī Zulaikhā, with great patience and fortitude, pre-
pared her son Nizām for his future life in which later he earned the blessings of
Shaikh Faridu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar.276 Under her careful planning and superb
management, the young Nizām spent the first twenty years of his life polish-
ing his scholarship and building trust in the Divine Will. Despite her poverty
and diminishing resources, Bībī Zulaikhā, instead of giving up, kept her resil-
ience and determination, and above all her trust in Allāh. A narrative showing
her excellence in managing arduous situations is about the early career of her
son Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn when she prepared with her own hands a headwrap
for her young son on completing the study of the text, Qudūrī.277 Narrated
by Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī, the immediate khalīfa of Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, Bībī Zulaikhā, determined not to disappoint him, got
the headwrap (dastār) readied at home and even offered food to those who
assembled there for the celebrations.278 She then, along with her daughter,
accompanied her son, who was now about twenty years of age, to Delhi.279

272 Muḥammad Jamāl Qiwām. Qiwāmu’l-ʿaqā’id, as reproduced by Nisar Ahmad Faruqui

in Qand-e Farsi, Cultural House of Iran, Dec–May, l994, pp. 2–110. (The manuscript of
Qiwām, Qiwām u’l- ʿAlāʾud is in the University of Osmania, Hyderabad). I have not seen
or accessed this source. All my translations are from the Farsi printed version. An Urdu
translation by Nisar Ahmad Faruqui is also available. See Qiwāmu’l-ʿaqā’id (1994 edn.).
Rampur: Idara Nashr-o-Ishāʿat.
273 Ibid, pp. 4–5 (MS. Folios. 7 a, b).
274 Tazkira wāṣilīn says that Khwāja Aḥmad died on 6 Shawwāl, 635/ May 22, 1238, and was
buried in Badayun near Sagar Tal, see pp. 60–69.
275 SA describes the grave of Khwāja Aḥmad in Badayun as rawzā-yi mutabarraka (the blessed
shrine) P. 95; Muḥammad Raẓiu’d-Dīn Bismil Badayuni in his Urdu book, Kanzu’l tārīkh
identifies the place of the shrine as near Sagar Tāl and writes further that the tomb was
rebuilt in 1184/1771 by the Rohilla Chief, Ḥāfiẓ Raḥmat Khan (d.1774). See Kanzu’l tārīkh.
1907. Badayun: Nizami Press, p. 67; also Tazkira wāṣilīn ( fasl dom), p. 67.
276 SA, p. 95.
277 The Mukhtaṣar of Abu’l Ḥusain al-Qudūrī (d. 438/1037) a leading Ḥanafī scholar of
Baghdad.
278 KM, Majlis 56.
279 Jamālī, p. 59. Delhi at this time was ruled by Sultan Ghiyasu’d-Dīn Balban (1266–1287).
398 Chapter 10

Siyaru’l Awliyāʾ, under the heading “some miracles of the Rābi’a of the
Age, Bībī Zulaikhā, the glory of womankind worldwide” (baʿze karāmāt aṅ
fakhrun-nisā’ fiʾal-ʿālamīn Rābiʿa al-ʿaṣr), presents an account of Bībī Zulaikhā’s
miraculous powers which, at all counts, if not higher than those of male Sufis,
are not of a lower category.280 Recalling the hardships of his childhood, Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn related his revered mother’s access to God (wālida-i mirā ba
khudā-i ta’ālā rasā’ī būd). Thus, whenever she needed something, a solution
would appear in her dream (itmām aṅ kār dar khwāb badīd) and the choice
(to fulfil her needs) would thus be given to her (ikhtiyār badast-i o mīdādand).
Amīr Khwurd further narrates a few other incidences which reflect Bībī
Zulaikhā’s virtues of kashf-i ilāhī or Divine revelation that accrue only when a
person’s heart, purged of all worldly desires by constant worship and remem-
brance, acquires the mystic attributes of seeing what is not perceived by an
ordinary eye. Thus, Bībī Zulaikhā could discern the signs of good fortune and
auspiciousness (ʿalāmat-i nekbakhtī wa saʿādat) by looking at the feet of her
young son. However, as life was too harsh and poverty and indigence enclosed
the Shaikh’s days of childhood, the young Shaikh, not solaced by his mother’s
words, submitted to his mother by saying, “You say I am lucky and fortunate,
however I see no signs of it.” The mother responded that he “would experience
it when I am gone.” The words came true. Amīr Khwurd mentions that Shaikh
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ further narrated how all the difficulties and challenges
of their life would vanish within a week or so, or at most within a month, due
to the charisma of his mother. “If my mother had some need, she would recite
ṣalāt (prayers) five hundred times in a day and would make supplications
by spreading the hem of her shirt. Her prayers were answered by the Grace
of Allāh.”281
Another incident recalled by Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn which shows the effec-
tiveness of her prayers happened when Bībī Zulaikhā’s only housemaid (kanīz)
absconded. Grieved by the loss, the Bībī, spreading her scarf, prayed to Allāh
(munajāt) and vowed that she would not cover her head with her scarf until
the maid came back. The moment these words were uttered, a man came to
the door and said, “Come, here is your maid.”
Recalling his mother’s illness, Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ narrated, “When
my mother—may she be blessed—fell ill, she asked me several times to visit
the tomb of a certain martyr or a certain pious person. I would obey her com-
mand, and when I returned home, she would say, ‘My illness is better, my

280 SA, pp. 149–152.

281 Ibid.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 399

affliction has eased.’”282 So great was the love and adoration of the Shaikh for
his mother that he mourned her death all through his life.
As the transmission of a Sufi’s barakā (spiritual power) is believed to remain
active even after a pious person’s death, miracles of Bībī Zulaikhā similarly did
not end with her passing away. Indeed, on the other hand, Sulṭānu’l-Mashāʾīkh,
despite the sanctity of his spiritual attainments, used to visit his mother’s tomb
to seek her blessings. Thus, when his relations with Sulṭān Quṭbu’d-Dīn were
estranged and the Sultan threatened him, the Sulṭānu’l-Mashāʾīkh, instead of
taking any action at the advice of his sincere followers, kept quiet (hech na
guft) and went to visit his mother’s grave (ba ziyārat walidā-yi khud baraft).
He believed that she alone could intercede on his behalf and would seek the
Divine protection against his worldly opponent. In the words of the Shaikh,
this is what he submitted to his dead mother: “This king intends to harm me. If
by the end of the coming month, the time when he plans to put me in trouble,
he is not seized, I would never come to visit you again.” Saying this, the Shaikh
returned to his place. While his followers and attendants were worried and
vexed, the Sulṭānu’l-Mashāʾīkh remained calm and composed with confidence
(khāṭir jamaʿ bar i ʿtimād) as he had petitioned his dead mother. While every-
one was worried that with the appearance of the new moon the Sultan’s wrath
would fall upon the Shaikh, the miracle did happen finally. Before the Sultan
could dare to harm the Sulṭānu’l-Mashāʾīkh, Khusraw Khan, the Sultan’s old
enemy, severed his head and threw his headless body from the rampart of the
fort. Not satisfied with this, the ruthless Khusraw Khan hanged the severed
head pierced with a spear to be viewed by the public.283
Amīr Khwurd, in Siyaru’l-Awliyāʾ, narrates another story as a testimony of
Bībī Zulaikhā’s baraka. Amīr Khwurd’s wife, a regular visitor of the Jamāʿat
Khānā, the khānqāh of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, and known for her trustworthi-
ness, once in a dream saw that people were running hither and thither as if it
was the day of Resurrection (qiāmat qāʾim shudā ast). She saw a man standing
there with a banner in his hand who told her, “‘This is the standard of Bībī
Zulaikhā, the glorious mother of Sulṭānu’l-Mashāʾīkh (īṅ ‘alam Bībī Zulaikhā
ast wālida mājida Sulṭānʾul mashā’ikh). You also come under the cover of this
standard.’ I, then, took refuge under this standard from all the tumult and
commotion.”284

282 FF Majlis 17, 709H.

283 For details of the assassination of Sultan Quṭb-u’d-Dīn Mubārak (1316–20) see, Barani,
Ẓiyā’ u’d-Dīn. 1862. Tārīkh-i Firūz Shāhī. (Edited by Syed Ahmad Khan). Calcutta:
Bibliotheca Indica, The Asiatic Society of Bengal (originally composed in 1359), pp. 401–9;
Nizami. The life and times of Shaikh Nizam-u’d-din Auliya. Delhi.
284 SA, pp. 151–152.
400 Chapter 10

The last conversation between the dying mother and her grieving young son
shows her staunch trust in Allāh. The son with tears in his eyes asked his dying
mother, “O Makhdūma! To whom would you leave this poor one?” Holding the
right hand of her son, she said, “God All Mighty! I leave him to Thee.” Recalling
the last words of his dying mother, Sultanu’l Mashāʾīkh said how grateful and
satisfied he was at the mīrās (heritage) his mother left for him—the protec-
tion by Allāh. He added, “I said to myself that even if she had left for me a
house full of gold and pearls, I would not have been happy.”285 The shrine of
Bībī Zulaikhā in Delhi, affectionately addressed as Māʾī Ṣāḥiba, offers bless-
ings and peace to all its visitors.286 The shrine of Bībī Zulaikhā near Mehrauli,
Delhi, also has graves of several other pious women, including the graves of
two sisters, Bībī Ḥūr and Bībī Nūr, the pious daughters of Shaikh Shihābu’d-Dīn
Suhrawardī (1145–1234/1235), the teacher and guide of Shaikh Baha‌ʾu’d-Dīn
Zakarīyya (1182–1262). They served Bībī Zulaikhā when she moved to Delhi
with utmost devotion and love. In the shrine complex of Bībī Zulaikhā are also
the graves of her daughter, Bībī Ruqayya, and granddaughter, Bībī Zainab. Both
these righteous women lived their whole life in the company of Bībī Zulaikhā
and were looked after by Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ.

10.5 Sufi Women Recognised as Murshid by Their Husbands

(1)
Ḥaẓrat Bībī Makhdūma
Period: Sixteenth Century
Place: Amethi, Lucknow, India

Ḥaẓrat Bībī Makhdūma, a woman immersed in Allāh’s devotion, was doubly

blessed as she was born and brought up in Amethi, a locality small in size but
with a glorious tradition in spirituality, the care of two celebrated Sufis, her
father and her husband. In a society where married women were subjected to
give obedience (ṭāʿat) to their husbands, Ḥaẓrat Bībī Makhdūma’s story pres-
ents a rare case of husband-wife relationship. Her husband, Ḥaẓrat Shaikh
Bandagī Miaṅ Nizāmu’d-Dīn Ambethwī, a mystic with a huge following, used

285 Ibid, p. 152.

286 Muḥammad ‘Ᾱlam Shāh Farīdī. 1912. Mazarāt awliyāʾ-i Dihlī (ḥiṣṣa awwal). Dihlī: Jān-i
Jahaṅ Press, pp. 56–58; Maulawī Aḥmad Saʿīd, Tārīkh Awliyāʾ-i Dihlī mʿarūf ba Tuḥfa-i saʿīd.
Dihlī: Maḥbūb al-Maṭābaʿ Barqī Press (1354/1935), p. 144.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 401

to address Bībī Makhdūma as his murshid (spiritual guide). As this reference

is rarely found, I assume that this was not a public statement of Ḥaẓrat Shaikh
Bandagī Miaṅ. However, his acknowledgment of learning from his wife is a sig-
nificant gesture as it reflects a relationship based on mutual respect between
two pious persons.
Bībī Makhdūma’s family was renowned for its deep affiliations with the
Qalandariyyā Sufi silsila in North India. She later married a man whose schol-
arship and love of Allāh brought a large number of devoted followers to his
house. A short life-sketch of Ḥaẓrat Bībī Makhdūma was given in a manuscript,
Manāqibu’l Awliyāʾ, which was authored by Amethi-born Mullā Aḥmad Jīwan
(1047/1638–1130/1718).287 Mullā Jīwan, Emperor Aurangzeb’s (d. 1703) tutor, was
a descendant of Ḥaẓrat Makhdūm Bahāu’l-ḥaqq Khāṣṣa-yi Khudā Amethwī288
(d. 1517), the father of Bībī Makhdūma Jahān, a Chishtī Sufi who is known as
the founder of the Qalandariyyā Sufi silsila in Amethi.289 Ḥaẓrat Khāṣṣa-yi
Khudā married two daughters (the second one following the death of the first)
of his disciple Shaikh Muḥammad bin Khwājgī Sidhorī.290 Ḥaẓrat Khāṣṣa-yi
Khudā’s second wife, Nāsika, became the mother of Bībī Makhdūma Jahān and
six more children.291
By the age of nine, Bībī Makhdūma Jahān came to acquire extreme spiritual
learning and knowledge.292 Mullā Jīwan, and later Lucknow-based mystic and
author Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf in his Bahr-e Zakhkhār (completed in 1788–1789),

287 This MS is extinct now. Another small Farsi text, about 35 pages, at some unidentified
date, titled Tazkira Buzurgān-i Amethī, based on the earlier manuscript was prepared.
Detailed quotes from this second Farsi text are included in Mullā Aḥmad Jīwan Amethwī-
ḥayāt aur khidmāt. Lucknow: Dāru’l ʿUlūm Ahl-i sunna (2015) by Muhammad Ṭufail
Aḥmad Miṣbāhī. I have used these references to reconstruct the life of Bībī Makhdūma
Jahān.
288 Badaoni identifies him as Aḥmad Faiyāẓ Amethiwāl and eulogises his spiritual merits. See
ʿAbdu’l Qādir Badaoni 1284/1867. Muntakhabuʾt tawārīkh. Lucknow: Maṭbāʿ Khās Munshi
Nawal Kishore, p. 307.
289 Mullā Aḥmad Jīwan, Tazkira buzurgān-i Amethī (Persian MS) quoted in Muḥammad
Ṭufail Aḥmad Miṣbāḥī. 2015. Mullā Aḥmad Jīwan Amethwī- ḥayāt aur khidmāt. Lucknow:
Dāru’l ʿUlūm Ahl-i sunna, pp. 175–180. For a short notice, see ʿAbduʾr Raḥmān Chishtī and
Wāḥid Bakhsh Siyāl. 1993. Mirʿātu’l asrār. Lahore: Ẓiāʾu’l Qurʾān Publications, pp. 1183–84.
ʿAbduʾr Raḥmān Chishtī’s paternal grandfather, Shaikh Budhdh was a khalīfa of Makhdūm
Khāṣṣa-yi khudā. see Nuzhat al Khwāṭir, vol. 4, p. 335. Amethi, being a centre of learning
and as the home of some acclaimed Sufis, was designated as Madina u’l awliyāʾ by Mullā
Aḥmad Jīwan, see Tazkira buzurgān-i Amethī (Persian MS) quoted in Mullā Aḥmad Jīwan
Amethwī- ḥayāt aur khidmāt, p. 28.
290 Nuzhatuʾl khwātir describes Shaikh Sidhorī as one of the men of learning and devotion,
vol. 4, p. 408.
291 Mullā Aḥmad Jīwan Amethwī, p. 177.
292 Ibid, p. 183.
402 Chapter 10

while addressing Bībī Makhdūma as kāmila bā ṣifāt (perfect in virtues) and

wāsilā-i zāt (one who is merged with the Essence [of God]), refer to the spiri-
tual blessings (niʿmat) of Ḥaẓrat Khāṣṣa-yi Khudā in refining Bībī Makhdūma
Jāhān’s spiritual yearnings.293
Ḥaẓrat Bībī Makhdūma was married to Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Bandagī Miaṅ
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Ambethwī (1494–1571/1572).294 The marriage took place in
918/1512.295 Miaṅ Nizāmu’d-Dīn was a khalifā of Shaikh Mʿarūf of Jaunpur
(869/1464–987/1579)296 who was a disciple of Maulānā Illahdād (d. 932/1526).297
Shaikh Mʿarūf, a perfect Sufi described as sāḥibu῾l mujāhidāt, conferred on
Bandagī Nizāmu’d-Dīn Ambethwī the walāyā of Kākorī.298 Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Amethwī, whose spiritual connection is traced to Shaikh Nūru’l Ḥaqq (known
as Ḥaẓrat Nūr Quṭb-i ʿᾹlam of Padua, Bengal [d. 813/1410]), was a master of
gnostic and charismatic qualities (ṣāḥib-i kash wa karamāt) in Dārā Shikūh’s
estimation.299 Because of his continuous and severe mystical exercises (sulūk
riyāẓāt-i-shāqqā), he enjoyed an excellent status of a gnostic whom Muḥaddis
Dihlawī describes as sālik-i majzūb and who remained intoxicated with
Divine Glory.300
Growing up under the influence of the above-mentioned spiritual masters,
Bībī Makhdūma Jahān, from her early childhood, developed a deep interest
in spiritual pursuits. Although Bībī Makhdūma Jahān was a gnostic and a
mystic (ʿārifa waliyya), she learned more in the company of her Sufi husband.

293 Ibid, p. 183; Bahr-e-Zakhkhār (vol. 3). pp. 369–69.

294 For his biographical notice, see, Muntakhabuʾt tawārīkh, pp. 282–86. Badaoni shows
great appreciation for Nizāmu’d-Dīn Ambethwī whom he visited twice in Ambethī and
was well-received by the mystic; Ghawsī Shaṭṭārī, writes about the spiritual merits of
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Ambethwī, though he could not personally know him but collected infor-
mation through a relative of the Shaikh, see Azkār-i abrār, pp. 577–97; AA, pp. 272; A short
note on Nizāmu’d-Dīn Ambethwī is given by ʿAbduʾs Samad bin Afẓal Muḥammad in his
Akhbāru’l Asfiyāʾ which was composed probably in 1017/1608. See Shadma Shahzad. 2013,
p. 261.
295 Muḥammad Samīʿuddīn. 2008. Saiyyid ʿAbdurraḥmān bin Faẓlu’llah al-mʿarūf ba Saiyyid
Sulṭān Bahrāʾīchī. Aligarh: Markaz-i Habib, p. 237.
296 The tomb of Shaikh Makhdūm Mʿarūf lies in Aldemau, a village in tehsil Kazipur, near
Sultanpur, UP. See, Anton Führer. 1891. Monumental Antiquities and Inscriptions in the
North-Western Provinces of Oudh. Allahabad: The superintendent Government Press,
p. 325.
297 This scholar-mystic is the author Sharah Kāfiya and Hidāya. See Muḥammad Dārā Shikūh.
1269/1853. Safīnatu’l-awliyāʾ (Lithograph text). Agra: Maṭbaʿ-yi Madrasa Agra, p. 331; AA,
pp. 188–89.
298 For short notice on Shaikh Mʿarūf see AA, p. 189.
299 Safīnatu’l-awliyāʾ, p. 331.
300 AA, p. 272.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 403

Interestingly, she also mentored and tutored her husband in several ways.
Thus, for example, Mullā Jīwan Amethwī, who himself excelled in external
and internal knowledge (bā kamālāt zāhir wa bāṭin), writes that once Bandagī
Miyāṅ Nizāmu’d-Dīn and Ḥaẓrat Shāh ʿAbdur Razzāq, Bībī Makhdūma
Jāhān’s younger brother, were performing ḥabs-i dam (breath control) but
did not know how to perform it properly and correctly (rāst nami āmad). Bībī
Makhdūma Jahān was watching this. She said, “Look, this is how you do ḥabs-i
dam,” and then she demonstrated by doing it herself (khud ḥabs-i dam kardan
shuruʿ namūd). Referring to her father, Makhdūm Shaikh Khāṣṣa-yi Khudā, she
said, “This is how I learnt it from Ḥaẓrat Bābū Jiū (mā īṅ nau῾ rā az Ḥaẓrat
Bābū Jiū akhaz kard).” It is said that whenever her father would begin zikr, jas-
mine flowers (chambelī) would begin falling out of his mouth. Each time Bībī
Makhdūma Jahān used to utter la ilāhā (there is no God) she would disappear
and the moment the words ilallāh (but Allāh) were uttered, she would be pres-
ent. Both Ḥaẓrat Shāh ῾Abdur Razzāq and Ḥaẓrat Bandagī Nizāmu’d-Dīn learnt
the practice of zikr from Bībī Makhdūma Jahān.301 Because of these merits,
Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn even acknowledged her as his murshid.302
Recalling Bībī Makhdūma Jāhān’s ṣabr (patience) and tawakkul (trust of
Allāh), the superb merits of a perfect Sufi, Mullā Jīwan narrates that when
pressed by poverty and privation, Ḥaẓrat Bandagī Nizāmu’d-Dīn was on the
verge of seeking redress from royal bounty. Bībī Makhdūma Jahān sought her
father’s intercession to dissuade him as she firmly believed that one should beg
for Allāh’s blessings only.303
Referring to the esoteric powers of Bībī Makhdūma Jahān, Mullā Jīwan nar-
rates a few incidences. For instance, she could comprehend birds’ conversa-
tions and even could hear the cooking pot’s complaints. Once, at the request
of a barren woman to bless her with children, Ḥaẓrat Bandagī Nizāmu’d-Dīn
indirectly predicted the birth of seven children by giving her seven green man-
goes. But Bībī Makhdūma Jahān immediately said, “No, this woman is not fated
to have seven children.” This turned out to be true as the woman lost two preg-
nancies and had only five children.304

301 Mullā Aḥmad Jīwan Amethwī, p. 186; Ḥaẓrat Maulānā Shāh Turāb ῾Alī Qalandar. 1293/1876.
Mujāhadātu’l Awliyāʾ. Lucknow: Munshi Nawal Kishore, p. 296.
302 Mullā Aḥmad Jīwan Amethwī- ḥayāt aur khidmāt. p. 186.
303 Ibid, p. 185; Another record, on the contrary, shows that Emperor Akbar, on his way back
from Bengal-Bihar, visited Ḥaẓrat Bandagī Nizāmu’d-Dīn in Amethi and granted him
and his father-in-law, Ḥaẓrat Bahāu’l-ḥaqq revenue-free land. See Lucknow: A Gazetteer,
vol. xxxviii. Ed. by H.R. Neville (Allahabad: Government Press United Provinces, 1904),
pp. 170–71.
304 Mullā Aḥmad Jīwan Amethwī, p. 184; Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, p. 369.
404 Chapter 10

Bībī Makhdūma Jahān, with the exemplary merits of a Sufi, was the mother
of six sons. Her date of birth and death is found nowhere. We know that
she was buried in Amethi. Following her demise, her elderly husband, past
eighty years, remarried. This time, the new wife was the young niece of Bībī
Makhdūma Jahān, her brother Ḥaẓrat Shāh ʿAbdur Razzāq’s daughter.305 This
was the third marriage of the Shaikh.306

10.6 Sufi Women Who Chose Not to Marry

(1)
Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr
Date: D. 790/1388–1389
Place: Dabhoi, Vdodara District, Gujarat
Shrine: Sahasrling in Naharwala, Gujarat, India

The only brief biographical notice about Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr is given by
Muḥammad Ghawsī bin Ḥasan bin Mūsā Shaṭṭāri Māndawī (b. 962/1554) in
his Gulzār-i Abrār (the rose garden of the pious), a biographical compendium
of Sufis. This biographical history of more than six hundred Sufis, mostly from
Gujrat, was completed between 1014/1605 and 1022/1613 during the era of the
Mughal emperor Jahangir (r. 1605–1627) and was dedicated to him.
Contrary to the prevalent method of referring to pious women as part of the
narrative of male Sufis, particularly their relatives, Ghawsī includes Bībī Ārām
Ḥaṣūr’s account as a separate entry in the main text itself. In a section dedi-
cated to the remembrance of the spiritual successors of Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ(yād khulāfa‌ʾ-i Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ Quds Allāh), who were at
least seven hundred in number and were posted to various parts of the coun-
try by Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr’s story is given.307 By placing
the notice on Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr as a separate entry, Ghawsī also revived the
old Islamic tradition of entering biographical notices about pious women in
writing biographical compendiums.308 Perhaps in following the same vein,

305 Badaoni, closing his narrative Ḥaẓrat Bandagī Nizāmu’d-Dīn, wrote that even at this ripe
age he was still producing children, see Muntakhabuʾt tawārīkh, p. 286.
306 Muḥammad Samīʿuddīn. 2008, p. 237.
307 Azkār-i Abrār, p. 118.
308 Ghawsī is also the first tazkira author to add a notice on Khadīja Bībī of Mandu and Būbū
Rāstī.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 405

Ghawsī’s first line in the notice on Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr says that “she is Saiyyid
Ḥasan Naharwālā’s sister.”309
Ḥāṣūr was not part of Bībī Ārām’s name, but rather an alias—the Arabic
word ḥāṣūr means close or abstaining from all commerce with women or a cel-
ibate. Ghawsī writes that the brother and the sister both were celibate.310 The
family of Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr, which originally hailed from Ghyaspur, a suburb
of Delhi where Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ had built his jamāʿat khāna, was
blessed with several saintly persons. Among these were her brother, Saiyyid
Ḥasan Naharwālā (d. 798/1395)311 and Saiyyid Ḥāmid Ḥasan Chishtī, her
nephew, the son of another brother who passed away in the state of ecstasy.312
We do not know much about Bībī Ārām’s personal life except that she
was an unmarried sister of Saiyyid Ḥusain Naharwālā. We do not even know
whether she was older or younger than her brother. Details about the personal
life of a Sufi are of less significance while mapping their spiritual journey. Thus,
the most outstanding information about her, and of far greater significance
than events of her personal life, is that Ghawsī accords Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr’s
status as equal to that of her saintly (ʿārif) brother in following the path of
sharīʿa and ṭarīqa. Both were the disciples of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ and
both were permitted by him to proceed to Gujarat and stay there (in donoṅ ko
buzurgwār pīr Sulṭanu’l Mashāiʾkh Nizāmuʿd-Dīn Awliyāʾ kī khidmat se Gujrat
jāne aur rahne kī ijāzat milī). This information, though conveyed in three short
sentences, is of far greater significance than an exhaustive volume on women
and gender status in medieval South Asia.
On Saiyyid Ḥusain Naharwālā, whose charismatic powers are recorded by
Ghawsī Māndawī, the mantle of khilāfat was bestowed by Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn
Awliyāʾ with orders to proceed to Gujarat for the guidance of the people
there.313 Ghawsī does not explicitly state that Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr was appointed
as his khalīfa by Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyā’. What he simply says is that
with the permission of her pīr buzurgwār (Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyā’) and
with Divine guidance as their companion (ilāhī taufīq ko rafīq banā kar), she
arrived with her brother in Gujarat and reached a small place named Kadūri,
near Dabhoi in Gujarat.314 There, in a small place which was not visited by
many, they both settled down and were lost in worshipping and remembering

309 Azkār-i Abrār, p. 118.

310 Ibid, p. 117.
311 For a short biographical notice of Saiyyid Ḥusain Naharwala, see Azkār-i Abrār, pp. 116–117.
312 Ibid, pp. 194–5.
313 Ibid, p. 117.
314 Kadūri could not be found on the map of Gujarat. An Internet search, however, showed
the word kadūri as the surname or the last name of several persons.
406 Chapter 10

Allāh in each of their breaths. Thus, through constant remembrance they both
received Divine bliss.
Ghawsī narrates that once an ill-mannered, ignorant, and impudent person
came there and made some insolent insinuations about the sister-brother rela-
tionship of these two Sufis. It so happened that this impertinent man hit the
back of Saiyyid Ḥusain Naharwālā with a stick. But instead of striking Saiyyid
Ḥusain, the back of the rude man was miraculously hit. Ghawsī says that since
then, every child born into the family of this man carries the mark of this beat-
ing on his back.315 Following this ugly incident, both brother and sister with
the permission of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ shifted to a secluded spot near
a pond named Sahasrling in Naharwālā and began spending their days lost
in Allāh’s remembrance in a small cottage. Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr died in 790/1388
and was buried in Sahasrling in Naharwālā, Gujarat. Later, Saiyyid Ḥusain
Naharwālā was also buried at the same place.316
Less than two centuries later, following the completion of Gulzār-i Abrār,
Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr appears in another biographical compendium of the Sufis,
Bahr-e Zakhkhār, written in 1788–1789 by Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf. Wajihu’d-Dīn
Ashraf’s account appears to be identical to Ghawsī Shaṭṭārī’s narrative, except
that he does not suffix her name with ḥāṣūr. This second account also confirms
that she was a disciple of Ḥaẓrat Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ (irādat ba Sultanu’l
Awliyāʾ dāsht) and was equal to her brother in following the path of spirituality
(dar sulūk rāh i ṭarīqat).317

(2)
Bībī Fāṭima Sām
Date: D. 643/1246
Place: Delhi, India
Shrine: near Qalʿa kuhna, (Kakanagar, opposite Oberoi Hotel) Delhi
ʿUrs: 17–18 Shʿaban

Ḥaẓrat Bībī Fāṭima Sām (raẓi Allāhu ʿanha) quddisa sirra-ha az ṣāliḥāt,
qāniʿtāt, ʿābidāt zamānā būd. (Ḥaẓrat Bībī Fāṭima Sām [may Allāh be
pleased with her and may her secrets be sanctified] was among the virtu-
ous, devout worshippers [of God] of her times).318

315 Azkār-i Abrār, p. 118.

316 Ibid, p. 118.
317 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, p. 370.
318 Text of the inscription on the tomb of Bībī Fāṭima Sām, displaying a quote of ʿAbdu’l Ḥaqq
Muḥaddis Dihlawī from his Akhbāru’l Akhyār, p. 280; Bashīruddīn Aḥmad writing in 1918,
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 407

The story of Bībī Fāṭima Sām, unlike the narratives of many other Sufi
women of South Asia, is not appended to male connections—a father, hus-
band, or son—perhaps because she had none on record. Bībī Fāṭima Sām, also
known as Bībī Sām or Bībī Ṣāʾima, lived in the historic area of Delhi called
Inderpat (Old Fort area of Delhi), during the heyday of the growth of the
Chishtī silsila of South Asia.319 Khwāja Ḥasan Nizāmī, without any citations,
conjectures that perhaps her father’s name was Sām.320 Although contem-
porary sources do not say anything about Bībī Fāṭima Sām’s formal initiation
into any Sufi silsila, Nizāmī says that Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn’s probably was her
Shaikh.321 Farīdī, without citing any source, says that as she was a disciple of
Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar, therefore Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, disciple and
khalīfa of Ganj-i Shakkar, was her pīr bhāī᾽ (spiritual brother).322 Thus, she
had close relationship with three Chishtī Sufis, i.e., Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i
Shakkar (d. 1265), his brother Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn Mutāwakkil (d. 1273), and
Farīdu’d-Dīn’s khalīfa, Sulṭānʾul Mashāʾikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, who as a
young person visited her often. Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, though much younger
in age, also had great devotion for her and spent hours listening to her.323 Thus,
the narrative of Bībī Fāṭima Sām, unlike most other Sufi women of South Asia,
achieved significant visibility and an exceptional recognition in the accounts
scribed by medieval Sufis who otherwise did not entertain unbiased views
about women.
Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn’s brother, Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn Mutāwakkil, had great
regard for her and had a unique relationship with her (bā īṅ Bībī Fāṭima
mawaddat būdā ast) such as that which exists between a sister and a brother
(bar ṭarīq-i-khwāhar wa birādar).324 ʿAbduʾs Ṣamad bin Afẓal Muḥammad, a
seventeenth-century biographer of Sufis, in his Akhbāru’l Aṣfiyāʾ (Reports on
the Sufis), eulogises Bībī Fāṭima Sām as sājida (one who prostrates herself),

however, says that this inscription was placed recently. See his Wāqiʿāt Dāru’l Ḥukūmat
Dihlī, pp. 657–58.
319 FF, Majlis 19, 11 of Zil Ḥajj, 720/1321; Dating back to India’s early history, Inderpat is now
a small neighbourhood near the Old Fort, Delhi. See Anirudha Ray, Towns and Cities of
Medieval India: A Brief Survey (Abingdon: Routledge, 2017); also A.K. Narain. ‘On the
Proto-history of Delhi and its Environs,’ (pp. 3–17), in E.R. Frykenberg (Edited) Delhi
through the Ages: Essays in Urban History, Culture and Society (Delhi: OUP), 1993.
320 Khwāja Ḥasan Nizāmī. 1947. bāʿis Khwāja kī chaukhat kā ziyārat nāma. Dehli: Daftar ḥalqā
mashāʾīkh, dargah Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, p. 19.
321 Khalīq Aḥmad Nizāmi. Ḥaẓrat Bībī Fāṭima Sām, (Dillī: Idara-i Adbiyāt Dillī, 1982), pp. 7–8.
322 Muḥammad ‘Ᾱlam Shāh Farīdī. 1912. Mazarāt awliyāʾ-i Dihlī (ḥiṣṣā awwal). (Dihlī: Jān-i
Jahaṅ Press 1912), p. 16.
323 FF, Majlis 19, 11 of Zil Ḥajj, 720/12 January 1321.
324 FF, Majlis 19, 11 of Zil Ḥajj, 720/1321; SA, p. 168; Jamālī, p. 101.
408 Chapter 10

sāliḥa (virtuous), and ῾ābida zamāna (a worshipper [of Allāh] of her times).
He also notes that she maintained friendly relations (rābiṭa mawakhāt dāsht)
with Najību’d-Dīn Mutāwakkil.325
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ’s spiritual successor, Shaikh Naṣiru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i
Dihlī (d. 1356), and the latter’s khalīfa, Khwāja Gīsū Darāz (d. 1422), remem-
bered her with utmost devotion and reverence. Gīsū Darāz, in a state of medi-
tation, even conversed with her after her death. Of all the above great Chishtī
Sufis, Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ’s account of Bībī Fāṭima Sām is the only firsthand
eyewitness account as he had seen her (man o rā dīdā būdam) and conversed
with her. Though she was old (muʿammar) when he met her, she retained good
memory and could quote verses pertaining to a situation (ḥasb-i ḥāl).326
Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar, who had seen Bībī Fāṭima Sām,
praised her as a virtuously remarkable woman (ʿazīz ʿaurat).327 Testifying of
Bībī Fāṭima Sām’s mystical virtues of worshipping and remembering Allāh,
Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn is reported by Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ to have said
that “the amount of this (one) woman’s remembrance of Allāh equals that
of ten perfect [perfect Sufi] men” (mashghūlī īṅ ʿaurat ma dah mard-i kāmil
ast).328 Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ recalled this adulation of Bībī Fāṭima Sām by
Bābā Farīd at another time in his conversations as recorded by Ḥasan Sijzi.
A woman who came to Ghiaspur to take the oath of allegiance at the hands
of the Shaikh on the evening of 27 Jumādiu’l-ukhrā 708/1308, caused a con-
versation about the numerous virtues that accrue from the virtues of women
(dar samara-i-ṣalaḥiyyat-i ʿaurāt). Recalling the memory of Bībī Fāṭima Sām,
a woman of uttermost virtues and sanctity (dar ghayat-i ‘iffat wa ṣalaḥiyyat),329
the Shaikh told his audience what his spiritual mentor, Shaikhu’l Islam
Farīdu’d-Dīn, repeatedly used to say about her. Referring to Bībī Fāṭima Sām,
Farīdu’d-Dīn said, “That woman was a man sent in the form of a woman” (āṅ
zan mard ast ki o rā dar ṣūrat-i zanān faristādand). Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ
then said that it is a custom of the derwishes that when they supplicate with
the intercessions of virtuous women and virtuous men, they invoke saintly
women first, because pious women are rare (darweshāṇ duʿā mī kunanand bā
ḥurmat-i nek zanān wā nek mardān, awwal nek zanān rā yād mī kunanad bā

325 ʿAbduʾs Ṣamad was a nephew of Abu’l Faẓl, the author of Akbar Nama. Akhbāru’l Aṣfiyāʾ a
manuscript completed in 1017/1608, has recently been studied by Shadma Shahzad for her
PhD dissertation. My references are drawn from this dissertation. See. Shadma Shahzad
2013, p. 313.
326 FF, Majlis 19, 11 of Zilḥajj, 720/12 January 1321.
327 Maʿāriju’l-Wilāyat. Fol. 652A.
328 Jamālī, p. 101.
329 FF. Majlis 20, 27 of Jumādiu’l-ukhrā, 707/24 December 1307.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 409

iʿtibār āṅki nek zanān gharīb bashand). The conversation ended with a signifi-
cant statement which, though made in the context of Bībī Fāṭima, sums up Sufi
males’ attitude towards Sufi women. He commented, “When a lion comes out
from the jungle, no one asks ‘is it male or female.’ That is to say, what matters
is that the children of Adam, whether they be men or women, are known for
their submission [to Allāh] and piety” ( farmūd ki sher az beshā berūn āyad kisī
nā pursad ki īṅ sher nar ast yā mādah, yaʿnī mi bāyad ki farzand-i ādam ba ṭāʿat
wa taqwā maʿrūf āyad khwāh mard bāshad khwāh zan).330
About twelve years later, in 1321, Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ again recalled Bībī
Fāṭima Sām. This time, the theme of his conversation was about revelation and
charisma (dar kashf wa karāmāt)—the two major characteristics of Sufism.
The Shaikh told the Assembly—and we assume that all present were men—
about the virtues of a woman, i.e., Bībī Fāṭima Sām. When he met her, she was
old in age (maʿmar shudā būd) and was known for extreme chastity (ghāyat-i
ṣalāḥyyat) and magnificent virtues (buzurg). One can surmise that Bībī Fāṭima
Sām was a well-educated person with an ability to remember several verses,
which she could recite relevant to the conversation (bait hāiʾ bisyār dar ḥasb-i
ḥāl) even in her old age. He then recited two of her hemistiches (miṣraʿa):

They may seek love, and they may desire for life.
Both desires, however, are not attainable.331

Bībī Fāṭima Sām had a tender heart and was always prepared to help oth-
ers. Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ narrated two instances to show how she
cared for others. One of these episodes is related to Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn
Mutāwakkil (559–671). Like a true Sufi, Bībī Fāṭima often used to send food to
Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn and his family who mostly went for days without eating
anything.332 Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn not only thanked her for her kindness but
also is reported to have commented on the purity of her heart that was not
even possessed by rulers who are expected to care for their needy subjects.
Describing her caring nature, Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ said that once
while he was sitting with her, Bībī Fāṭima suggested to him to consider mar-
rying a girl she knew. Marriage had never been in the cards for the Shaikh!333
Bībī Fāṭima’s love and care for fellow human beings is illustrated further by

330 Ibid.
331 FF, Majlis 19, 11 of Zilḥajj, 720/12 January 1321.
332 Jamālī, p. 101; For the poverty of Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn Mutawakkil and his family, see KM,
Majlis 21.
333 FF, Majlis 19, 11 of Zilḥajj, 720/12 January 1321.
410 Chapter 10

ʿAbdullah Kheshgī in his Maʿāriju’l-Wilāyat, a biography of South Asian Sufis

written in 1094/1682. Kheshgī quotes a saying of Bībī Fāṭima, “All the bounties
of this world and the hereafter are tossed away (niʿmat hāʾye dīnī wa dunyawī
nisār) for the bread and a cup of water given to a needy (az barāʾye nān wa
kūzā-i āb ki bakisi dehand)”.334
Ḥāmid Qalandar, in Khairu’l Majālis, the malfūz of Shaikh Naṣiru’d-Dīn
Chirāgh-i Dihlī (1276–1356), writes about the forty-one Majlis, which took
place when most of the devotees in attendance were observing six-day obliga-
tory fasts of Shawwāl. In this assembly, the Shaikh recalled Bībī Fāṭima Sām’s
piety, abstinence, extreme asceticism, and utmost trust in Allāh, even when
death overtook her. According to this narrative, Bībī Fāṭima Sām used to fast
continuously (ṣaum bar ṭarīq dawām), except on days in which fasting is not
permissible. She never used to break her fast (hargiz roẓā ifṭār nākardi). Her
maidservant (kanīzak), who used to earn money by doing some kind of labour
all day (mazdūrī), in the evening would place, close to Bībī Fāṭima’s prayer mat
(pesh-i muṣallā), two pieces of dried barley bread (du nān-i jau khushk) and a
bowl of water (yak kūzā āb) for her to break the fast. She then would get back
to work on her spindle to make cotton thread. Once, after the evening prayer,
while Bībī Fāṭima was about to partake of some of this meal, a thought crossed
her mind that if this night was to be her last night (agar im-shab ākhriṅ shab
ḥayāt-i tū bāshad), she would depart after having a full gratification (ḥazz-i
dunyā), i.e., after eating a meal. She then wrapped the bread, put it away in a
niche (ṭāq), and, pushing the bowl of water away, resumed her prayers. In the
meantime, a beggar came to the door and she gave away the bread to him. That
night when sleep overpowered her (nīm shab khwāb ghalbā kard), she expe-
rienced a sort of soliloquy—a dialogue with herself (bākhud guft) in which
she reprimanded herself saying that if she had passed away that evening (after
eating the meal) what a pity, as the Angel of Death (malaku’l maut) would have
found her asleep (khuftā) as a result of having eaten a meal. Since this noc-
turnal self-admonition, Bībī Fāṭima remained awake for the rest of the night
(hamā shab bedār būd) and kept offering prayers. Perhaps this was the month
of Ramaẓan because towards the second half of the night, her maidservant or
slave girl placed two pieces of bread and a bowl of water in front her prayer
rug. The Bībī did not touch the meal. For the next forty days, she continued
fasting without eating anything and reminded herself that this could be her
last night on this earth. On the fortieth eve, she saw a fearful-looking stranger

334 Maʿāriju’l-Wilāyat, folio. 652 alif.

Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 411

(mard-i bā haibat) standing in her courtyard.335 On enquiry, he told her that he

was the Angel of Death and was there to seize her spirit (qabz rūḥ-i tū). Instead
of getting terrified, she requested that he spare her a little time so that she
could perform fresh ablution (tajdīd-i waẓū) and offer prayer for ablution. He
did that. While she was in prostration, the Angel of Death seized her life ( jān-i
o qabẓ kard) and she passed away. Concluding the narrative of Bībī Fāṭima,
Shaikh Naṣiru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī observed, “A Sufi serves the time (al-Sufi
ibnu᾽l waqt) and should make the best of this time (ghanīmat dārad) and
should remain engaged in prayer all the time as one does not know whether
one would have time [for prayers and remembrance] or not.”336
That same night, Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn Mutāwakkil arrived at Bībī Fāṭima
Sām’s house and led her funeral prayers. She was buried on the banks of a water
tank (bar-kinar-i-ḥauẓ) of Inderpat.337 Later that same night, after her burial,
Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn Mutāwakkil saw her in dream as if she was offering prayers
in Heaven (bālā-iʿarsh). To Najību’d-Dīn Mutāwakkil’s query about where she
was, she said, “in the realm of Transcendental Manifestation (ʿālam-i-jabarūt)
in the company of Bībī Fāṭima Zahra, may Allāh be pleased with her.”338
A story (ḥikāyat) of a mystical experience of Khwāja Gīsū Darāz in which
Bībī Fāṭima Sām is the central character and which was well known in the
Khwāja’s khānqāh, is cited in Siyar-i Muḥammadī. According to this legend,
once Khwāja Gīsū Darāz went to visit the shrine of Bībī Fāṭima Sām in Inderpat
and sat for meditation (nazdīk dar qabr-i mubarak murāqaba shudand) close
to her grave. In this state, he met with the spirit (rūḥ) of Bībī Fāṭima Sām and
asked her to say something about her station (maqām) and stage (martaba).
She told him that when she was going far up, from her place to that of God (dar
bālā dar Ḥaẓrat mī raftam), she arrived at the celestial gateway (dar-i āsmānī).
The doorkeepers told her to stop until the permission (iẓn) came. The Bībī said,
in the story, “I sat down there and took an oath (saugand khordum) not to go
until I was allowed to go without any other’s intercession (baghair wāsiṭā).”
The story further says that soon Ḥaẓrat Khadīja, Ḥaẓrat Bībī Fāṭima, and other
wives and daughters of the Prophet arrived and told her that they were sent (by
Allāh) to fetch her. She refused and said that though she has the highest rever-
ence for the august persons yet she would move only without any intercession.
Allāh ordered them to move away, and suddenly “a soft melodious superlunary

335 ῾Abdu’s Samad, the author of Akhbāru’l Asfiyāʾ, describes this person as mard-i Nūrāni
(luminous man), see Shadma Shahzad. 2013. p. 314.
336 KM, Majlis 41; Jamālī, pp. 101–2.
337 SA, p. 168; Jamālī, p. 102.
338 Jamālī, p. 102.
412 Chapter 10

voice called out (naghma-yi laṭīf wa ṣaut-ī ẓarīf nidā kardand)—‘come towards
Me’—only then she moved ahead.”339
The above hagiographical narrative, with a little twist at the end of the story,
is found in Sharaḥ Jawāmiu’l kilam. Its compiler, Saiyyid Muḥammad Akbar
Ḥusainī, Khwāja Gīsū Darāz’s eldest son and khalifā, cast doubts about the
above narrative and speculated that this anecdote is about the Khwāja himself
who according to his old habit, refers to himself in this episode in mysterious
and hidden ways (sīghā-i-ghaib).340 Khwāja Gīsū Darāz, however, narrating
another incident about the miraculous powers of Bībī Fāṭima Sām said that
a son was born to a childless man with the power of a talisman given by Bībī
Fāṭima. Later, as this child, being born crippled, could not walk, was cured
completely by her miraculous powers.341
Khwāja Gīū Darāz’s reverence for Bībī Fāṭima was so great that on Thursdays,
the day marked for talqīn (instructions) after the zuhr prayers (afternoon
prayer, the second mandatory prayer of a day), his disciples were instructed
to bring khichri (rice mixed with lintels), raughan (purified butter), jughrāt
(curd), hezam (firewood), and namak (salt) for the reward of Bībī Fāṭima’s soul
(bar rūḥ-i Bībī Fāṭima).342
After a long gap of more than three and a half centuries, when ʿAbdu’l Ḥaqq
Muḥaddis Dihlawī compiled his Akhbāru’l Akhyār (Narratives of the Chosen
Ones), he placed Bībī Fāṭima first in his section on Sufi women as she was one
of the ṣālīḥāt, qānitāt waʿābidāt (virtuous, devout, and worshipper of God) of
her time.343
Khwāja Ḥasan Nizāmī, writing in the early twentieth century, gives an
incredible anecdote regarding the miracles of Bībī Fāṭima Sām. It is said that
she weaved a cover sheet for the grave of Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar
with her own hands. Once, thieves stole all the covers of the grave, as some of
them were woven with gold threads. The Bībī’s cover was also stolen, though it
had no gold threads. The thieves burned the covers, hoping to extract the gold.
Miraculously, the cover made by Bībī Fāṭima Sām was not ruined by the fire.

339 Shāh Muḥammad ʿAli Sāmānī, Siyar-i Muḥammadī (compiled in 1427) National Museum,
Karachi, MS No. NM-1970-267. Urdu translation by Shāh Nazīr Aḥmad. 1347/1928. Siyar-i
Muḥammadī: ma‘ tarjama al-mʿarūf, Tuḥfah al-Aḥmadī. Ilāhābād: Yūnānī Dawakhānah,
pp. 50–51; this hagiographical narrative, without mentioning the name of Khwāja Gīsū
Darāz is also given in Bahr-e-Zakhkhār, p. 363.
340 5 Shaʿbān, 802, pp. 106–8 in Khwāja Bandā Nawāz Gīsū Darāz and Muḥammad Akbar
Ḥusainī. 2010. Sharaḥ Jawāmiʿulʾ u’l-kilam (malfūzāt of Saiyyid Gīsū Darāz, compiled by
Akbar Ḥusainī. Translated by Wāhid Bakhsh Siyāl Chishtī Ṣabirī). Lahore: al-Faisal, 2010.
341 Ibid.
342 Siyar-i Muḥammadī (Siyar-i Muḥammadī tarjama al-mʿarūf, Tuḥfah ye-Aḥmadī), p. 82.
343 AA, p. 280.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 413

Ḥasan Nizāmī says that this cover, with some signs of fire on it, is still kept in
the shrine of Bābā Farīd so that the devotees can view it.344
The story of Bībī Fāṭima Sām, Nizāmī says, stands as an exemplary story
for women.345 Her story helps us in reviewing women’s status in the age she
and the male Sufis, with whom she was on friendly terms, lived. First, all the
five major male Sufis of the Chishtīyya silsila—Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i
Shakkar, his brother, Shaikh Najību’d-Dīn Mutāwakkil, and his khalīfa, Sulṭānu’l
Mashāʾikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, Shaikh Naṣiru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Dihlī, a khalīfa
of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, and Khwāja Gīsū Darāz—accepted Bībī Fāṭima as a
Sufi of excellent virtues. In addition, from the perspective of women’s history,
it is interesting to note that Bībī Fāṭima was a contemporary of two other vir-
tuous women, Bībī Sāra (d. 1240) and Bībī Zulaikha (d. 1250), and of one ruler,
Raẓiyya Sulṭān (d. 1240). Perhaps they were not destined to meet each other
and did not have camaraderie with each other.
Probably Bībī Fāṭima was not a married woman and lived alone in the com-
pany of her female attendant. We find no reference about her family, husband,
or children in the discourses of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ or of Shaikh Naṣīru’d-Dīn
Chirāgh-i Dihlī. Only one reference about her personal life comes from Khwāja
Gīsū Darāz who recounts Bībī Fāṭima’s words that once her parents selected
a husband for her. He went into battle, perhaps before the consummation of
marriage, and was martyred. Later, when the parents tried to select another
one for her, she told them if she had been fated to have one, the first one would
have survived. Now she would not marry.346 Bībī Fāṭima not only met freely
with men who were not her blood relatives (maḥram), but also spent consider-
able time talking with them, not only on spiritual matters but worldly matters
as well, such as suggesting a girl for marriage to Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ who
at that time must have been young but of a marriageable age.347 Thus, both
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ and Saiyyid Gīsū Darāz, as shown above, often used to
visit her grave, spending hours meditating and praying.348 So great was her
sanctity that even the abdāls remained in attendance while she was alive and
continued to be present at the shrine as well.349
As the city of Delhi went through several vicissitudes of history, the shrine
of Bībī Fāṭima Sām, which in the words of Amīr Khwurd was qibla-i ḥājat-i
khalq (provider of people’s needs) and was luminous with the Inner Light

344 Bāʿis Khwāja kī chaukhat kā ziyārat nāma, p. 19.

345 K.A. Nizāmi, Ḥaẓrat Bībī Fāṭima Sām, P. 10.
346 Sharaḥ, 5 Shaʿbān, 802/ 1 April 1400, p. 108.
347 FF, Majlis 19, 11 of Zilḥajj, 720/12 January 1321.
348 KM, Majlis 99.
349 KM, Majlis 99; JK, 5 Shʿabān 802/1 April 1400. pp. 106–107.
414 Chapter 10

(nūr-i bāṭin), gradually turned into relatively a quieter place. In 1935, Khwāja
Ḥasan Nizāmī (d. 1955), a custodian of the dargāh of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ,
saw devotees assemble for the ʿurs celebrations at Bībī Fāṭima Sām’s painted
limestone shrine surrounded by clumps of trees.350 More recently, in 2002, a
Muslim philanthropist of Delhi rebuilt the shrine.351 Today, the shrine contin-
ues to receive pilgrims and devotees.
Thus, Bībī Fāṭima Sām has retained her visibility through several centuries
to the present. Thus, Syed Abdul Hayy Nadwi al-Hasani (d. 1999), in his Arabic
language monumental biographical dictionary of five thousand Indian schol-
ars and Sufis, acknowledges Bībī Fāṭima Sām’s taqwā (piety) and ṣalāḥ (vir-
tues) and refers to her as one of the virtuous women.352

(3)
Saiyyida Ḥāfiza Bībī
Date: Unknown
Place: Uṭātūr, Tamilnadu, India
Shrine: Uṭātūr on the banks of River Kaveri

Source material for reconstructing the life of Saiyyida Ḥāfiza Bībī, whose
shrine is in Uṭātūr, a small village on the banks of river Kaveri in Karnataka,
comes from Bahār-i ʿĀzam Jāhī, the early nineteenth-century pilgrimage
travel account written in Persian of ʿĀzam Jāh Bahādur Nawāb Wālājāh IV of
Carnatic (1820–1825) written in Persian353 and which its English transla-
tor rightly describes as “an indispensable supplement and corrective to the
accepted notions of the history of Islam in south Asia.”354 The Nawāb’s royal
cavalcade arrived at this place in 1238/1823. Close to a small rivulet whose water

350 Muḥammad ʿAlam Shāh Farīdī. 1330/1912. Mazārāt awliyā’᾽-i Dihlī (ḥiṣṣā awwal). Dehli:
Jān-i jahāṅ press. p. 17. Also, Ruknu’d-Dīn Nizāmī. 1935. Tārīkh Awliyāʾ-yi Ṣūbā Dehli. Kutb
khānā Maḥbūbī, Dehli, p. 23; also. Bāʾīs Khwāja kī chaukhat kā ziyārat nāma, pp. 18–19.
351 The dargah and its adjacent land, a property of Waqf Board, came into the limelight, as
the area was illegally occupied and sold away in 2013. See, ‘Sale of and illegal construc-
tion on Waqf Land in Delhi’s Kaka Nagar’ … https://www.urdumediamonitor.com/…/sale
-illegal-construction-waqf-land-delhis-kak ….
352 Nuzhat al-khawāṭir vol. 1, p. 113.
353 Bahār-i ʿᾹzam Jāhī: rūdād-i safar-i maimanat asr-i Nawāb ʿᾹzam Jāh Bahādur of Ghulām
ʿAbdu’l-Qādir Nāzir. 1961. Edited by Muhammad Yusuf Kokan Usmani. Madras: Electric
Press, pp. 124–25. (The travel account was later translated into English and edited by
Muḥammad Ḥusayn Nainar of Madras University). See Bahār-i ʿᾹzam Jāhī of Ghulām
ʿAbdu’l-Qādir Nazir. 1950. Translated by S. Muhammad Husayn Nainar. Sources of the
History of the Nawābs of the Carnatic. Madras University Islamic Series No. 11.
354 Muḥammad Ḥusayn Nainar, p. ix.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 415

is not palatable due its high-grade lime properties, the royal travel party stopped
at the shrine (gumbad) of Saiyyida Ḥāfiza Bībī to pay her homage. Maulawī
Ghulām ʿAbdu’l Qādir Nāzir (1200/1786–1243/1828),355 Nawāb Walājah’s travel
diary scribe, despite his reverence for Ḥāfiza Bībī, refrains from giving details
about her life. Even her real name is not recorded. She was known as Saiyyida
Ḥāfiza Bībī because she had memorized the Qurʾān, and this name probably
also indicates her lineage as being a descendant of the Prophet’s family. In clos-
ing his brief narrative of this pious (ṣāliḥa), unmarried (nā-katkhudā) woman
who died at young age, he writes, “It is not possible to describe in this book what
all I heard about her purity and chastity (taqaddus wa ʿiffat),” and thus keeps
the details to himself. Nāzir’s narrative of Saiyyida Ḥāfiza Bībī, despite its brev-
ity, is significant. She had memorised the Qurʾān by heart (Ḥāfiza Qurʾān sharīf
būd) and could recite it well. She had also performed the Ḥajj pilgrimage and
thus gained an exalted status for the next world (sharf-i ʿuqbā ḥāsul namūd).
Hajj pilgrimage by a young, unmarried woman must have been a remarkable
feat. At the time of his visit, the Nawāb found a lamp over her grave, which
used to be lighted on the third day of her death anniversary and kept burning
for the next forty days.356 The author, however, does not give the date of Ḥāfiza
Bībī’s death anniversary nor mentions the year of her birth or death.

(4)
Bībī Khwurd
Place of Birth: Bilgram
Shrine: Mohalla Khurdpura, Bilgram, UP, India

Ghulām ʿAlī Āzād Bilgrāmī (d. 1200/1786), the most erudite eighteenth-
century scholar and a person of spiritual pursuits, in 1180/1767 published
Maʿāṣiru’l-kirām (the contemporary celebrities), which he describes as tazkira
dar ṣāḥib kamilān-i Bilgrām (Memoirs of mystics of Bilgram) and which indeed
is a treasure house of information about mystics and scholars about whom lit-
tle or nothing was recorded earlier. In the first section, faṣl awwal dar zikr fuqrā
quds (first chapter about the pious mystics) of his native Bilgram, Āzād pres-
ents brief narratives of eighty Sufis and Mashāʾikh. The last notice in this list is
about Bībī Khwurd (the young lady) without giving any dates about her birth
or death. Bībī Khwurd, though young in years, was strong in her resistance of

355 Maulawī Ghulām ʿAbdu’l Qādir Nāzir had inherited traditions of great scholarship and
devotion from his family. For an introduction to his life and achievements, see Bahār-i
ʿᾹzam Jāhī, pp. 1–46 (Introduction by Muhammad Yusuf Kokan Usmani).
356 Bahār-i ʿᾹzam Jāhī, pp. 124–25.
416 Chapter 10

all worldly indulgences. She preferred death to marriage as, for her, there was
no place for anything except the yearning for the Divine in her heart.
Bībī Khwurd was born and brought up (maulid wa manshā) in Bilgram,
a town in Uttar Pradesh, India. When she reached adulthood, her parents
wanted to arrange marriage for her (o rā kad-khudā sāzand) and started pre-
paring for her marriage. She refused (ibā kard) to marry, but the parents did
not stop (nā guzāshtand) and went ahead with their celebrations (marāsim-i
ṭūʾī shrūʿ kardand). When the mashāṭṭā (bride-dresser) adorned Bībī Khwurd
with finery and presented her for bridal display ( jalwa), a different kind of dis-
play happened. The bride, with a smile on her lips, passed away to the world
of the souls (anjuman-i ruhaniān kharāmīd). Witnessing this, the parents were
grieved (dāgh shudand). They buried her in her bridal attire adorned with
ornaments. At nightfall, when greedy and callous robbers and thieves (duzdān)
came to open the grave and plunder the rich adornments, by the will of Allāh
they all went blind (nabīnā shudand) even before they could lay their hands
upon the grave to defile it. Aghast, they remained lying there. At dawn, as the
news of her charisma spread, devotees thronged to her last resting place. Āzād
says that her grave would remain a place of visitation for people (ziyāratgāh-i-
khalāʾiq) till the Last Day. The area where her shrine stands is named after her
as Khwurdpurā.357
More than two decades later, following the publication of Maʿāṣiru’l-kirām,
Shaikh Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf Awadhi composed his voluminous work, Bahr-e-
Zakhkhār (the rising sea) in 1788–1789, which consists of brief life accounts
of Sufis and other mystics. One of the notices of mystic women in Bahr-e-
Zakhkhār is a verbatim narrative of Āzād’s story above of Bībī Khwurd, though
Wajihu’d-Dīn does not admit this.358
Saiyyid Farzand Aḥmad Bilgrāmī (d. 1890), in his Tārīkh-i Bilgrām (History of
Bilgrām), says that most probably Bībī Lohri, in whose remembrance prayers
are held by women in Bilgram, is Bībī Khwurd. He also says that some of the
songs sung for the bride and which create a condition called harārā (passion
or frenzy) in the bride are the songs that were sung on the occasion of Bībī
Khwurd’s wedding.359 Thus, women keep the memory of Bībī Khwurd alive.

357 Ghulām ʿAlī Ᾱzād Bilgrāmī. 1910. Daftar-i awwal Maʿāṣiru’l-kirām. Agra: Maṭbaʿ Mufīd-i
ʿĀ m, p. 175.
358 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, vol. 3, p. 367.
359 Saiyyid Farzand Aḥmad Bilgrāmī. 1983. Tārīkh- i Bilgrām. Karachi: Ṣaghīr Bilgrami
Academy (first published in 1883), p. 60.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 417

(5)
Makhkhan Bī
Date: D. Sunday, 6 Safar 1140/22 September 1727
Place: Burhanpur, India

Born in a pious family, Makhkhan Bī’s life story is told in a narrative by ʿAbdu’l
Jabbār Khan Mulkapurī.360 Her grandfather, Shāh ʿAbdullah, alias Bhīkājī
Qādirī (d. 999/1590), was a person of ascetic virtues of self-denial who gave
up his well-paid job in the mint and spent the rest of his life in search of the
Divine. It is said that his virtuous life encouraged several persons to enter into
Islam.361 Makhkhan Bī was the daughter of his second son, Shaikh ʿAbdu’l
Qādir. As a voluntary decision, she chose to remain unmarried and to spend
her days in devotion and worship.362
The pious (ʿafīfa) and virtuous Makhkhan Bī was unparalleled in perfec-
tion (kamālāt) and Allāh’s obedience (ʿibādāt). She was ḥāfiẓ-i-Qurʾān and
used to recite it every day. An ascetic par excellence, she used to fast always
(ṣāʾimu’d-Dahr) and even on ayyāmu’l tashrīq363 and on the two ʿĪds would eat
only as little as one usually eats for breaking a fast. Even her maidservants,
forty in number, learned the Qurʾān by heart and kept fasts on a regular basis,
in addition to those in the month of Ramaẓan. She used to lead the tarāwīḥ364
prayers in which all her forty maidservants used to be the muqtadi.365 During
these prayers, Makhkhan Bī used to recite the whole Qurʾān. She was also well
versed in the Persian language.
A mustajābu’d-Daʿwāt (one whose prayers are answered by Allāh), Makhkhan
Bī was blessed with miraculous healing powers. Often a mere touch of her

360 Maḥbūb zi al-minān: tazkira-awliyāʾ-yi dakan, pp. 523–24.

361 Shāh ʿAbdu’llah Bhīkājī travelled to Madina to pursue spiritual knowledge. After stay-
ing there for 21 years, he returned to India during the days of Emperor Shāh Jahan and
became a disciple of Shaikh Muḥammad bin Faẓlu’llah in Burhanpur. Aurangzeb con-
ferred upon him land grants. For more details, see Azkār-i Abrār, p. 393; also, Maḥbūb
zil-al-minān: tazkira awliyāʾ-yi dakan. pp. 520–22.
362 Maḥbūb zil al-minān: tazkira-awliyāʾ- yi dakan, pp. 522–24.
363 ayyāmu’l tashrīq are the 11th, 12th and 13th of the month of Zilḥajj, the 12th and the final
month of the Islamic lunar calendar and are counted as days when fasting are not per-
missible. See, ʿAmr ʿAbdul-Munʿim Saleem. 2005. Important Lessons for Muslim Women.
Riyadh: Darussalam, p. 249.
364 Tarāwīḥ is an additional prayer offered in the month of Ramaẓan after the last evening
prayer of ʿisha‌ʾ.
365 Muqtadi is a person who stands behind the prayer leader during ṣalāt.
418 Chapter 10

hand (yad-i-baiẓā)366 would cure ailments. With her power of intuition, she
could warn people of future mishaps. Her final hour approached in a mystical
way. She dreamt that Bībī Fāṭima Zahra, the beloved daughter of the Prophet,
beckoned her to offer prayers standing on her (Bībī Fāṭima Zahra’s) scarf. Once
she had finished the prayer, Bībī Fāṭima Zahra raising her three fingers, sig-
nalled her to come close. Interpreting the dream when she awoke, Makhkhan
Bī announced that only three days were left before she was to die. The pre-
diction came true as she passed away exactly three days later. All through the
eighty-five years of her life, this God-fearing woman missed not a single ṣalāt
or fast. At the time of her death, she left behind a meagre sum of two rupees
which she had borrowed from someone for her burial expenses. Makhkhan Bī
never married, but she tenderly took care of the children of her brother, Shaikh
Shukru’llah, and provided for their education.

(6)
Būbū Rāstī
Period: Sixteenth Century
Place: Burhanpur, India

Būbū Rāstī is the only daughter of Shaikh Lashkar Muḥammad ʿᾹrif (d. 993/
1585),367 who was a disciple of Shaikh Muḥammad Ghaws of Gwalior (d. 970/
1563) of the Shaṭṭārī Sufi silsila. Būbū Rāstī was an exceptionally learned person
whose scholarly lectures and discourses were regularly attended in large num-
bers by scholars and Sufis. ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgī, in Maʿāriju’l wilāyat, which he
completed in 1094/1683, erroneously says that Būbū Rāstī was Shaikh Lashkar’s
wife (mankūḥa).368
Casual and brief references about this superbly qualified scholar who
taught men some of the most challenging texts on mystical expositions illus-
trate the worst example of textual marginalisation of women. Shaikh Lashkar
Muḥammad ʿᾹrif was born in Mahalsa, a small suburb in Gujrat. In his early
teens he joined the army. As his heart was pulled by the mystic teachings of Qāzi

366 Yad-i-baiẓā means a white hand but allegorically refers to the miracles of Ḥaẓrat Mūsā
(Prophet Moses).
367 Shaikh Lashkar Muḥammad ʿᾹrif was born in Mahalsa, a small suburb in Gujrat. In his
early teens, he joined the army. As his heart was pulled by the mystic teachings of Qāẓī
Maḥmūd Birpuri, he left the army at the age of sixteen. Later, he was blessed by the guid-
ance of Shaikh Quṭb-i Jahan Shaikh Muḥammad Ṣadru’d-Dīn Zākir Nahrwala (996/1587–8
or 997/1588–89) and Shaikh Muḥammad Ghaws of Gwalior (d. 970/10/1563). For his biog-
raphy, see Azkār-i abrār, pp. 361–64.
368 Cited by Makhdūm Salīmullah Siddiqui in his edited footnotes in Burhanpur ke Sindhi
Awliyāʾ by Saiyyid Muḥammad Maṭiʿu’llah Rashid Burhanpurī. Haidarabad: Sindhi Adabi
Board, 1957, p. 134.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 419

Maḥmūd Bīrpuri, he left the army at the age of sixteen. Later, he was blessed
by the guidance of Shaikh Quṭb-i Jahan Shaikh Muḥammad Ṣadru’d-Dīn Zākir
Nahrwala (d. 996/1587–1588 or 997/1588–1589) and of Shaikh Muḥammad
Ghaws of Gwalior.369
Muḥammad Ghawsī Shaṭṭārī Māndawī (b. 962/1554),370 the author of
Gulzār-i Abrār (the rose garden of the pious), is the first one to mention the
name of Būbū Rāstī while narrating a mystical episode of Shaikh Muḥammad
ʿᾹrif on the authority of his disciple, Masīhu’l awliyāʾ ʿĪsā Jundu’llah (962/1555–
1031/1621–1622). In this narrative, Ghawsī Shaṭṭārī suffixes the name of Būbū
Rāstī with the most honorific description, i.e., addressing her as the Rābʿiā
of her times.371 Ghawsī then describes two anecdotes narrated by Būbū
Rāstī to Ḥaẓrat ʿĪsā Jundu’llah. According to the first one, Būbū Rāstī told ʿĪsā
Jundu’llah that one morning, her father told a secret to her and her brother,
Malik Muḥammad, on the promise of guarding its secrecy. Shaikh Muḥammad
ʿᾹrif told them that for the last thirty years, he had kept his status as the Quṭb
a secret. He also told them about his mystical experience when, while in deep
meditation, he heard a voice calling him, asking him why he was sitting in dark-
ness when “I am sending you the Light.” As soon as these words were uttered,
the whole place became luminous. On another occasion, Būbū Rāstī related
the incredible mystical experience of her father which she had witnessed.
According to this, once Shaikh Muḥammad ʿᾹrif was in an indescribable state
of intense mystical absorption. When he recovered from this state, he told her,
he was taken to the station of Bāyazīd Basṭāmi and saved himself by the Grace
of Allāh from uttering Subḥānī (Glory be to me) and instead said, Subḥānahu
(Glory be to Him). ʿĪsā Jundu’llah, verifying the authenticity of the narrative,
also added that when this incident happened, he was also called by his mentor,
Shaikh Muḥammad ʿᾹrif.372
Muḥammad Ghawsī stops writing anything further about Būbū Rāstī. This
silence, or omission, comes as a surprise, particularly because Ghawsī was in a
privileged position of knowing the Shaṭṭāri Sufis well and often corresponded

369 For his biography, see Azkār-i Abrār. pp. 286–90; Also see the hagiographical account,
mostly, stories of miracles of Shaikh Muḥammad Ghaws by Shāh Faẓlu’llah Shaṭṭārī.
Manāqib-i Ghawsiya. Translated from the author’s manuscript in Urdu by Saiyyid
Muḥammad Zahīru’l Ḥaqq. Agra: Abu’l ʿAla‌ʾī Steam Press, 1933 [the manuscript ends
in the year 941/1534. Further information was added by the translator]. Also see Ernst,
Carl W. “Persecution and Circumspection in Shaṭṭārī Sufism.” In Islamic Mysticism Con-
tested: Thirteen Centuries of Debate and Conflict. Edited by Fred De Jong and Berndt
Radtke, 3–7. Islamic History and Civilization. Leiden, The Netherlands: E.J. Brill, 1999.
370 Like Muḥammad ʿᾹrif Lashkar, Ghawsī was also a disciple of Shaikh Muḥammad Ghaws
of Gwalior.
371 Azkār-i Abrār, p. 363.
372 Ibid, pp. 363–64.
420 Chapter 10

with ʿĪsā Jundu’llah. Ghawsī refers to his correspondence with ʿĪsā Jundu’llah
on the issue of the above-referenced last episode concerning the station of
Bāyazīd Basṭāmi.373
Another significant aspect of the story of Būbū Rāstī—which again is
described mainly within the context of the activities of three prominent men,
i.e., ʿĪsā Jundu’llah, Khān-i Khānān ʿAbduʾr Raḥīm (964/1556–1036/1672), and
his son, Darāb Khan—is about attending a lecture of Būbū Rāstī at her hujra
(cell).374 Saiyyid Muḥammad Maṭiʿu’llah Rāshid Burhanpurī, in his account
of the lives of the Sufis of Sindh in Burhanpur, adds this anecdote as a prop
supporting Shaikh ʿĪsā Jundu’llah’s connections and activities and not as an
account of Būbū Rāstī. According to this story, once Khān-i Khānān ʿAbduʾr
Raḥīm and his son Darāb Khan requested Masīhu’l Awliyāʾ Ḥaẓrat Shaikh ʿIsā
Jundu’llah to take them to Būbū Rāstī as they were greatly interested in attend-
ing her lectures. Riding bahli, a bullock-driven vehicle, they reached Rastipura.375
When they arrived there, they found Būbū Rāstī delivering a lecture on schol-
arly treatises such as Lamʿāt (Divine flashes), authored by Fahkhru’d-Dīn Irāqī
(1213–1289), and Nuzhat al-arwāḥ, written by Sadāt Ḥusainī (d. 717/1317).376 A
recent author, ῾Atīqu’llah Talmīzsāz, without citing any reference, claims that
thousands of people received the blessings ( faiẓ) of her instructions. Although
Talmīzsāz has not specified the gender of the attendees, one can presume
that these were largely men. Despite this rare and exceptional quality of high
scholarship, Būbū Rāstī appears in short references in the larger narrative of
her father. Talmīzsāz also says that she managed and supervised the shrine
of her father and used to distribute tabarruk to the devotees, including the
male devotees.377 Despite her excellence and virtues, her brother, Shaikh Abu
Yazīd Shaṭṭārī Burhanpurī (d. 999), succeeded his father.378 Būbū Rāstī died
where she used to teach and instruct. The dates of her birth and demise remain
unknown. Perhaps she lived alone and did not marry.

373 Ibid, p. 365.

374 Though no description of this place is given in the texts, however, it appears to be a place
spacious enough to accommodate a large audience.
375 Rastipura is a small neighbourhood in the southern parts of Burhanpur where Shaikh
ʿᾹrif Lashkar used to stay. The place came to be known after Būbū Rāstī.
376 Saiyyid Muḥammad Maṭiʿu’llah Rāshid Burhanpurī. 1957. Burhānpur ke Sindhi Awliyāʾ.
Haidarabad: Sindhi Adabi Board, p. 95; Shaikh ʿᾹrif Lashkar’s maternal uncle, Shaikh Walī
Muḥammad, a disciple of Shaikh Muḥammad Ṣadru’d-Dīn Zākir Nahrwala, wrote a com-
mentary of Nuzhat al-arwah which was widely read in Gujrat. For the biography of Shaikh
Wali Muḥammad, see Azkār-i Abrār, p. 345.
377 ῾Atīqu’llah Talmīzsāz. 1987. Anwār-i Burhānpur. Burhanpur: Maṭiʿu’llah Hafizullah
khānqāh, p. 63.
378 Ibid, pp. 126–27; Azkār-i Abrār, pp. 393–94. Maḥbūbzil-manan-Tazkira Awliyāʾ yi dakan,
p. 102.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 421

10.7 Sufi Women Who Managed the Male Shrines

(1)
Bībī Allāh Dī
Period: Sixteenth Century
Place of Birth: Ajodhan
Place of Death: Burhanpur, India

The life story of Bībī Allāh Dī (Gift of Allāh), a scion of the family of Shaikh
Farīdu’d-Dīn Masʿūd Ganj-i-Shakkar, though lacking in details, shows how the
decision of Shaikh Farīd not to appoint his daughter as one of his spiritual dep-
uties underwent change at the hands of Ḥaẓrat Shāh Bhikārī Chishtī. Bībī Allāh
Dī was the eldest daughter of Shaikh Yūsuf, known as Shaikh Jūsī (d. 850/1446),
a migrant Sufi from Ajodhan. Similar to most other early medieval Sufis, Shaikh
Jūsī, a spiritual successor of his father, Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Muḥītu’d-Dīn, along with
his family left his place of birth and settled in the Deccan. Shaikh Jūsī travelled
widely. On his return from the Ḥajj pilgrimage, he travelled to Asirgarh where
he was warmly welcomed by the ruler, ʿᾹdil Shāh, who, along with his court-
iers, became his devoted disciple and made several endowments, including a
land grant in Burhanpur where the Shaikh built a mosque and his khānqah.379
In the account of Shaikh Nizāmu’d-Dīn, popularly known as Shāh Bhikāri
Chishtī of Burhanpur (d. 907/1501), recorded by ʿAbdul Jabbār Khan Mulkapurī,
a few lines about the merits and virtues of Bībī Allāh Dī are included as part
of the major narrative of her brother.380 The first reference is to the childhood
days of Bībī Allāh Dī when her mother passed away after giving birth to a son
following a miraculous pregnancy lasting for more than twelve years.381 Later,
her father, Shaikh Jūsī, brought the family from Ajodhan to Burhanpur. There is
no information about at what age Bībī Allāh Dī arrived in the Deccan. We next
hear about Bībī Allāh Dī when her younger brother, whom she had brought
up like a mother, was about to die. We know that Bībī Allāh Dī lived with her
brother and took care of his household. Most probably she remained celibate.

379 Barakātu’l Awliyāʾ, pp. 116–17.

380 For a biographical notice on Ḥaẓrat Shāh Bhikāri Chishtī, see Maḥbūb zilmanān: tazkira-
yi-awliyāʾ-yi-dakan, pp. 213–221. ʿAlī ʿᾹdil Shāh of Bijapur (r.1538–1580) was his great devo-
tee; also, see Barakātu’l Awliyāʾ, pp. 129–131; Saiyid Athar Abbas Rizvi. 2004. A History of
Sufism in India, vol. 2, pp. 283–4; Biographical Encyclopaedia of Sufis: South Asia, pp. 297–
98. In public memory, Ḥaẓrat Shāh Bhikārī Chishtī is Sarkar-i Burhanpur (master of
Burhanpur).
381 According to this miracle story, on the fortieth day, following the birth of Ḥaẓrat Shāh
Bhikārī, the mother could not survive the shock when the new-born son began talking to
her. See Maḥbūb al-zilmanān: tazkira-yi-awliyāʾ-yi-dakan, p. 220.
422 Chapter 10

As the time of his death approached, Shāh Bhikāri Chishtī handed over his
newborn daughter and the administration and supervision of his khānqāh to
his elder sister, Allāh Dī.382
Though she had taken care of Ḥaẓrat Shāh Bhikārī from his infancy, Bībī
Allāh Dī was reluctant to take the responsibility of managing the khānqāh.
A sagacious person with high qualities of abstinence and devotion for Allāh,
she said, “How could a humble fox (rūbah miskīn) manage the affairs of the
lions (sheroṅ)? Men only can do men’s jobs.” To this, Shāh Bhikārī Chishtī
responded, “In qualifications (ṣifāt) you are no less than men,” and that settled
the issue. After his demise in 907/1501, Bībī Allāh Dī managed the khānqāh,
looked after the needs of the incoming travellers, and cared for the disciples
and attendants (murīdīn wa khādīmīn), a task that required regular and strong
contacts with the khānqāh and its visitors, the majority of whom were men.383
Although contemporary historians and scribes have mentioned the position
and status of Bībī Allāh Dī as the manager and supervisor of the khānqāh with-
out acknowledging its unique importance, it is significant to note that Ḥaẓrat
Shāh Bhikārī had a large number of male disciples and also several spiritual
deputies, including Shāh Manṣūr Majzūb (d. 958/1551),384 Shāh Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn,
Shaikh Barkatu’llah, and Shāh Manjhu.385

(2)
Khadīja Bībī
Date: B. 1534
Place: Mandu, District Dhar, Malwa, India

The only narrative about Khadīja Bībī is found in Gulzār-i Abrār, a late
sixteenth-century tazkira of 422 Sufis of Hindustan, especially of Gujarat, by
Shaikh Muḥammad Ghawsī Shaṭṭārī (962/1554–1027/1618).386 Sadly, Ghawsī,
despite his own admission that Khadīja Bībī’s real status (haqīqat-i ḥāl) is far
too great and far-reaching, cuts short her story. Khadīja Bībī, born sometime
in 941/1534, belonged to a family with strong Sufi traditions.387 Her father’s

382 This khānqāh stands on the banks of river Utawali and continues to be the centre of devo-
tional visitation.
383 Maḥbūb al-zilmanān: tazkira-yi-awliyāʾ-yi-dakan, pp. 215–16.
384 For his biographical notice, see Barakātu’l Awliyāʾ, pp. 144–45.
385 Maḥbūb al-zilmanān: tazkira-yi-awliyāʾ-yi-dakan, p. 221.
386 Azkār-i Abrār, pp. 119–20.
387 Her great grandfather, Shaikh Baha‌ʾu’d-Dīn Ṣiddīqī, grandfather, Shaikh Najmu’d-Dīn, and
uncle, Shāh Miyāṅ Jī Chishtī (d. 918/ 1512) were Sufis. For legends of their miraculous pow-
ers, see Azkār-i Abrār, p. 219.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 423

paternal uncle, Miāṅ Jī Chishtī (d. 918/1512) was known for his spiritual pow-
ers and charisma. When her father, Shaikh Nūru’llah, the spiritual successor
of Miāṅ Jī Chishtī, died in 941/1534, Khadīja Bībī, his only child, was just four
months old. From that time forward, there is a long gap in the narrative of
Khadīja Bībī. The next information in Gulzār-i Abrār is when her son, Shaikh
Quṭbu’d-Dīn, passed away in 1010/1601. The death of her only son did not cause
Khadīja Bībī to give up her trust in Allāh. Instead of mourning and shedding
tears over her loss, Khadīja Bībī decided to look after the shrines of her ances-
tors in Mandu. She continued doing this until the time of Ghawsī’s writing in
1612. Thus, at the age of sixty-seven, the widowed Khadīja Bībī, despite the loss
of her grown son, was looking after the shrines of her ancestors. Ghawsī says
nothing about the nature of her responsibilities. It can be assumed that she
had to deal with unrelated men—devotees and disciples of her father, uncles,
and grandfather, as well as shrine visitors.
Muḥammad Ghawsī knew her personally. Since 1601, the year of her arrival
in Mandu after her son’s demise, she stayed with Ghawsī. Thus, Ghawsī for at
least eleven years had observed her saintly living. Based upon his personal
observations, writing in 1021/1612, Ghawsī noted that undoubtedly Khadīja
Bībī was one of the gnostics (ʿārifāt), which speaks volumes about her saintly
virtues. Finally, he concludes that none among the women Sufis of her times
were like her in virtues of steadfastness, magnanimity ( jawāṅmardi), selfless-
ness, and abstinence.388 There is no information about the year of her death.

10.8 The Majzūb (Intoxicated) Sufi Women

(1)
Bī Amma Ṣāḥiba
Period: Early Twentieth Century
Place: Kamptee, Maharashtra, India

Bī Amma Ṣāḥiba’s story of spiritual journey began in Kamthi (now called

Kamptee), located nine miles northeast of Nagpur in the state of Maharashtra,
India, just below the confluence of the Kanhan, Pench, and Kolar rivers.
Founded in 1821 as a military cantonment of the British colonial army in the
neighbourhood of the native capital of Nagpur, Kamptee is now an important
centre of trade.

388 Ibid, p. 220.

424 Chapter 10

The city was blessed by the presence of Tāj Awliyāʾ (the crown of the friends
of Allāh), Bābā Tāju’d-Dīn Nāgpurī (1861–1925), whose spiritual blessings
turned a little girl to the path of Allāh.389 An orphaned child of Saiyyid
Badru’d-Dīn, an Indian soldier in the Madras regiment, Tāju’d-Dīn also began
his career as a soldier in the colonial army. Soon, sometimes in 1892, Tāju᾽d-Dīn
was thrown into a lunatic asylum on charges of roaming around naked in
the cantonment. It was in this asylum that the first meeting between Bābā
Tāju’d-Dīn Nāgpurī and Bī Amma took place.
Among several legends about the life of this little girl, now reverentially
addressed as Bī Amma (the Mother), one says that she was born as a boon
to her parents who made supplications before Bābā Tāju’d-Dīn Nāgpurī for a
child. According to this tale, Bī Amma’s father was a pesh imām (one who leads
the prayer) of a mosque who had lost all his children. His wife vowed that if any
future child of theirs survived, she would offer that child to Bābā Tāju’d-Dīn.
The prayers were answered and the girl survived (b. 1302/1885) and spent sev-
eral years in training under Bābā Tāju’d-Dīn’s auspicious care. When she grew
up, her family took her away to marry her off. However, after a little while, Bī
Amma would get into transformative moods ( jazb). The parents took her back
to the presence of Bābā Tāju’d-Din, where she soon came out of this state.390
Another story, which appears more credible, is related by Abdul Ghani
Munsif. Munsif writes that, like Bābā Tāju’d-Dīn, Bī Amma was a majzūb. At the
command of Ḥaẓrat Da‌ʾūd Shāh Chishtī, she visited him while Bābā Tāju’d-Dīn
was in a lunatic asylum. As soon as Bābā Tāju’d-Dīn saw her, he threw a stone
towards her, breaking her glass bangles and thus shattering all her chains with
the world. Addressing her, he said, “Where were you? I have been waiting for
you for the last twelve years.” Bī Amma became a disciple of Bābā Tāju’d-Dīn
under whose guidance she went through long and enduring spiritual exercises
of self-denial and piety, including spending several years all alone in forests
and thick woods.391

389 Abdul Ghani Munsif. 1939. “Miracles of Baba Tajuddin.” Meher Baba Journal, 1(12): 21–30;
P.S.V. Aiyer. 1959. Perfect Masters. Calcutta: Sri Sai Samaj; Nile Green. 2009. Islam and the
Army in Colonial India. Sepoy Religion in the Service of the Empire. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, pp. 120–127; James Richard Newell. Experiencing Qwwali: Sound as
Spiritual Power in Sufi India (Unpublished submitted to the Graduate School of Vanderbilt
University for Doctor of Philosophy, 2007), pp. 40–70.
390 Roy Burman. 2002. Hindu-Muslim Syncretic Shrines and Communities. New Delhi: Mittal
Publications, pp. 192–198.
391 Abdul Ghani Munsif. 1939. “Hazrat Baba Tajuddin of Nagpore.” Meher Baba Journal, 1(6):
46–55.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 425

Several incidences of her miraculous performances are related with great

devotion by her followers. It is said that once she cured a patient of leprosy by
covering him overnight with her headscarf (dupatta). She loved gardening and
took great care of fragrant flowers.392 To attain Allāh’s love, she taught sim-
ple things to her followers, such as to love all and to have contentment in life.
Humility in this world is obedience to Allāh, she said. A person should remain
flexible as only in death does one get stiff.393

(2)
Anonymous Majzūba of Muḥammadpur
Period: Late Eighteenth Century
Place: Muḥammadpur, near Lucknow, India

Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf Awadhi was a resident of Awadh who composed bio-

graphical notices of South Asian Sufis. His work, Bahr-e Zakhkhār (the ris-
ing ocean), was published in 1789. Since his early childhood, he had been an
ardent and devout follower of taṣawwuf, spending his time in the company of
the mystics. The mystic woman whom Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf identifies by the
anonymous title Zan-i majzūba (an intoxicated Sufi woman), in this anthology,
was his contemporary and was known to him. She lived in Muḥammadpur,
in District Barabanki, which is at a distance of twenty-eight kilometres to the
north of Lucknow, now the capital of Uttar Pradesh, India.
Zan-i majzūba lived life as a recluse, avoiding public places or meeting with
anyone, and therefore did not step out of her place (muṭlaq sair na kardi).
Perhaps because of the heat of the intensity of her mystical powers, she used
to eat whey (dogh) during the summer. With her mystical powers of knowing
the unknown (az rūʾ-i kashf), she could tell about a person’s past and present.
Once, Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf, from a distance (probably from Lucknow), sent a
verbal message to her through one of her devotees (muʿtaqid). This person,
on reaching the presence of the Majzūba in Muḥammadpur, forgot to deliver
the message. Looking at him, she said loudly, “The message has reached me.”
Repeating the message, what she said was exactly what Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf
had earlier told the man to convey.394 Narrating another miraculous power of
Zan-i majzūba, Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf writes that she could hold boiling hot pots
of food with her bare hands and would not feel the heat.

392 Hindu-Muslim syncretic shrines and communities, pp. 192–198.

393 Khwāja Shamsu’d-Dīn ʿAẓīmī. 2002. Ek sau ek Awliyā’-yi Allāh khwatīn. Karachi: al-Kitāb
Publications, pp. 197–200.
394 Bahr-e-Zakhkhar (vol. 3). p. 342.
426 Chapter 10

Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf, like most other scribes, has left the story of Zan-i
majzūba incomplete.

(3)
Ḥaẓrat Bābājān
Date: D. 8 Jamādiu’l awwal 1350/21 September 1931
Shrine: Pune, India
ʿUrs: 9–11 Jamādiu’l-awwal

A strange-looking woman in a dishevelled state of appearance, with a huge crop

of matted grey hair and known by a male name, Ḥaẓrat Bābājān, is revered for
her virtues of self-denial and her ascetic and miraculous powers. Her small but
solemn-looking and beautifully built shrine, made of white marble with teak
doors, is located on the Malcolm Tank Road in Pune, India, in an area locally
known as Char Bawdi. It attracts not only devotees but academic researchers
as well.395
The story about her ancestry emerges from local legends and hagiography.
Some of her biographers say that she was a Pashtu-speaking Baloch of noble
descent.396 In his recent research, Newell says that she came from an elite
Afghānī family.397 Most, however, agree that she was a Pashtun woman called
Gul-rukh at birth who left home at the age of eighteen to begin her journey of
spirituality. For a while, she donned a male disguise to hide her female iden-
tity and wandered around. She reached Poona where she settled down in 1905
under a neem tree on the Malcolm Tank Road.398 It was here that she died at
the age of 125 years in 1931. Ramakrishnan describes one of her miracles, as
observed by one eyewitness. According to this narrative, Ḥaẓrat Bābājān, while
on a steamer going for Ḥajj, saved the steamer and its passengers from a hur-
ricane by her miraculous powers.399
The dissertation of Newell documents additional information not known
before. Drawing upon interviews, Newell writes that though Bābājān was not

395 James Richard Newell. Experiencing Qawwali: Sound as Spiritual Power in Sufi India, (Ph.D.
thesis in Religion)—Vanderbilt University. Dec. 2007, pp. 78–79.
396 K.K. Ramakrishnan. 1998. Hazrat Babajan: The Emperor of the Spiritual Realm. Pune: Meher
Era Publications.; B. Kalachuri. 1986. Meher Prabhu. North Myrtle Beach: Manifestation,
Inc.; Abdul Ghani Munsif. 1961. “Baba’s own masters: Part One: Haẓrat Babajan of Pune.”
Awakening Magazine, 8 (1): 12–22.
397 James Richard Newell. Experiencing Qawwali: Sound as Spiritual Power in Sufi India, (Ph.D.
thesis in Religion)—Vanderbilt University. Dec. 2007, 78–79.
398 Hazrat Babajan: The Emperor of the Spiritual Realm, p. 80.
399 Ibid, p. 20.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 427

initiated into any Sufi silsila, today this mystic woman has a “broad popular
appeal with many followers in Pune and all over India.” Interesting informa-
tion that comes from Newell is that “her shrine and the cultural capital associ-
ated with her legacy, was appropriated by representatives of the Chishtī silsila
soon after her death, or perhaps even as her death seemed to be imminent.”400
Drawing upon two letters published in the Times of India in September 1926,
Newell writes that her presence in the cantonment area irked the authorities,
but they could not dare move her from where she used to lie under a neem
tree because of the fear of mob outcry. The colonial administration was not
alone in their dislike of her; though persecuted and tormented by orthodox
religionists, she remained unruffled and continued her mission of extending
hope and peace to those who came to seek her blessings. Viewed as a Sufi by
some, Bābājān was indeed a qalandar (mystic or ascetic who travels from place
to place in search of the Divine).401
I close this account of Bābājān with a quote by Newell: “Babajan’s popular-
ity was not inspired by her institutional affiliation or bloodline, but rather, by
her austerities as a faqir, and her state of mind, which was understood by her
followers as an ascetic state of divine absorption, of majdubiyya [attraction to
the Divine].”402

(4)
Bāʾī Jī
Date: D. 1837 or 1838
Place: Delhi, India

Bāʾī Jī, a woman with mystical powers, lived in a dishevelled state during
the twilight years of the Mughal Empire in Delhi.403 Sir Syed Ahmad Khan
(d. 1898) gives the first biographical notice of Bāʾī Jī404 in his Āsāruʾs Sanādīd,
a book on the monuments of Delhi, which also includes biographical notices
of mystics, scholars, poets, painters, musicians, and singers who had lived in
the city. In the last chapter of this book, in a section titled “an account of peo-
ple of ecstasy” (majzūboṅ kā bayān), Sir Syed writes that Bāʾī Jī “was an excel-
lent woman” (ʿaurat bā kamāl). No one knew what her real name was but to

400 Experiencing Qawwali: Sound as Spiritual Power in Sufi India, 2007, p. 80.
401 Kevin R.D. Sheperd.1985. A Sufi Matriarch: Haẓrat Babajan. Cambridge: Anthropographia
Publications; Haẓrat Babajan, 1981.
402 Experiencing Qawwali: Sound as Spiritual Power in Sufi India, p. 80.
403 Bāʾī Jī is a respectful term for women of position.
404 Syed Ahmad Khan, Sir. 1293/1876. Āsāruʾs Sanādīd, (Chapter Four). Lucknow: Maṭba‌ʾ
Nawal Kishore, p. 33.
428 Chapter 10

all she was known as Bāʾī Jī. Outside Shāhjahānābād, the old name of Delhi,
next to the old ʿĪdgah, she lived her whole life under a thatched shed. It is said
that during conversations, she frequently repeated Qurʾān verses, especially
Inna ʿātaynākal Kawsar (Qur’an: verse 108). When anyone would go to her to
seek her blessings, she would select seventeen kūziān405 out of whatever was
brought as an offering and would place these on the floor and pick them up
again seventeen times, reciting Innāʿ ātaynākal Kawsar each time. Whatever
would come to her heart, she would say that to the petitioner (sāʾil), and what-
ever she would utter would happen exactly the way she had said.406 She passed
away a year before Sir Syed Ahmad Khan completed his book.
Later on, two authors, Bashīruddīn Aḥmad in his extensive account of the
city of Delhi, Wāqiʿāt Dāru’l Ḥukūmat Dihlī, and Maulawī Aḥmad Sāʿīd in Tārīkh
Awliyāʿ-i Dihlī, included Sir Syed’s narrative almost verbatim.407

(5)
Māʿī Bhāgī
Date: D. 1847
Place: Lahore, Pakistan

Ghulām Sarwar Lahorī (d. 1890) has included a brief narrative of Māʿī Bhāgī
in the list of eleven pious women in his Ḥadīqatu’l-Awliyāʾ, a book on lives of
Sufis.408 This narrative was written forty-three years after the death of Māʿī
Bhāgī, yet both of them, i.e., Māʿī Bhāgī and Ghulām Sarwar Lahorī, had lived
as contemporaries in the city of Lahore. Thus, the narrative could be consid-
ered an eyewitness account, though the author does not say this.
Māʿī Bhāgī’s years of youth were spent in frivolous activities. She used to sell
alcoholic drinks in the city of Lahore during the rule of Maharaja Ranjit Singh
(d. 1839). Her ravishing beauty, youth, and the wealth that she earned by sell-
ing intoxicants brought a large number of pleasure-seeking men around her.
She was lost in the glamour of this life, which soon ended in a mysterious way.
One day a man named Zulfiqār came to her and asked her for a cup of wine.

405 Lumps of crystalized sugar.

406 Sir Syed wrote this work probably in 1839 and published it in 1840. Thus, Bāʾī Jī passed
away in 1839 or a little before this. For details about the year of publication of Āsāruʾs
Sanādīd, see C.M. Naim. 2011. “Syed Ahmad and His Two Books Called ‘Asar-al-Sanadid.”
Modern Asian Studies. 45 (03): 669–708.
407 Wāqiʿāt Dāru’l Ḥukūmat Dihlī (ḥiṣṣā duʾm), p. 404; Maulawī Aḥmad Sāʿīd. 1354/1935. Tārīkh
Awliyāʾ-i Dihlī maʿrūf bā Tuḥfa-i Sāʿīd. Maḥbūbu’l-maṭābʿ Barqī Press, Dihlī, 148.
408 Ḥadīqat-ul Awliyāʾ, p. 243.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 429

She filled it for him. He took a sip and then gave it back to her, telling her, “Sip
[the rest of it].” She drank all of it. As she sipped it, a miracle happened. She
tore off her clothes, threw away all the ornaments that adorned her body, and
turned into a majzūbā. She gave away all the wealth and properties that she
had accumulated over the years. Wrapped in tattered old rags, she took abode
in an open space near the Akbari Gate in Lahore. People thronged around
her because whatever she uttered came true. Even Maharaja Ranjit Singh, the
founder of Sikh rule in Lahore, had great faith in her. To seek her blessings,
Pandit Ganga Ram Kaul Dehlawi409 used to visit her so frequently that one
day out of desperation she sternly said to him, “Why are you pestering me? Go
away and do some job in the Diwānī (state department).” So, he got a job there.
Ghulām Sarwar ends this account by saying that towards the end of her life,
Māʿī Bhāgī developed an interest in constructing buildings. He does not say
any more about it. Māʿī Bhāgī died in 1847. I could not trace her last resting
place in Lahore.

(6)
Khānam Ṣāḥib
Period: First Half of the Nineteenth Century
Place: Delhi, India

Sir Syed Ahmad Khan (d. 1898), in the fourth chapter, “an account of Delhi and
the people of Delhi” (ahl-i Dihlī), in his Āsāruʾs Sanādīd (a book on the monu-
ments and people of Delhi), gives biographical notices of mystics, scholars,
poets, painters, musicians, and singers. The section on mystics is followed by
an account of people of ecstasy (majzūboṅ kā bayān). In this section, Sir Syed
writes about two women who were his contemporaries and were alive around
1840, the time of the completion of Āsāruʾs Sanādīd.
The first of these two women is Khānam Ṣāḥib (not to be confused with
Khānam Jī). Sir Syed writes, “Khānam Ṣāḥib was a godly woman (bākhudā
ʿaurat). In her inner purification (ṣafāʾī-i bāṭin), she was better than thou-
sands of men. She lived in Haweli Sher Afghan Khan near Ballimaran. Though

409 Pandit Ganga Ram (1851–1926) remembered for Ganga Ram Hospital, Lahore and Govern-
ment College, Lahore, was invited in 1813 by Ranjit Singh from Delhi to Lahore and was
appointed as his finance minister. Lepel H. Griffin. 1890.The Punjab Chiefs: Historical and
Biographical Notices of the Families of Lahore and Rawalpindi Division of the Punjab (vol. 1),
Lahore: Civil and Military Gazette, pp. 56–58; Syad Muhammad Latif. 1892. Lahore: its
history, architectural remains and antiquities, with an account of its modern institutions,
inhabitants, their trade, customs, &c. Lahore: Printed at the New Imperial Press, p. 332.
430 Chapter 10

ecstasy ( jazb) mostly overpowered her temperament, but not to the extent of
losing herself (khud raftagī). Large numbers of people, elite as well as the com-
mon people, came to her to seek the fulfilment of their needs (adā-yi ḥājit)
through her intercession. Whatever she uttered in response to their petitions
and entreaties entirely came true (bi kam-o-kāst). About two or four months
have passed since she left this world.”410
Bashīruddīn Aḥmad, in his voluminous account of the city of Delhi, Wāqiʿāt
Dāru’l Ḥukūmat Delhi, has copied the above narrative of Sir Syed almost verba-
tim without acknowledging the source. He does not mention about her pass-
ing away.411 Later, Aḥmad Sāʿīd in 1935 wrote another account of the Sufis of
Delhi in which he, too, like Bashīruddīn Aḥmad, repeated Sir Syed’s narrative
of Khānam Ṣāḥib. The only change he made was that instead of Khānam Ṣāḥib
he called her Khānam Ṣāḥiba.412

(7)
Bībī Nawāzan
Date: Eighteenth Century
Place: Jaipur, Rajasthan, India

Bībī Nawāzan’s early life remains unknown. She used to roam around the
street of Jaipur, in Rajasthan, in mystic ecstasy. Jaipur was then under the rule
of Maharaja Sawai Ram Singh (1835–1880). As an enraptured Sufi (majzūbā),
whatever was uttered by Bībī Nawāzan always came true. She was found sit-
ting around Char Darwaza, a Muslim part of the city. Oral traditions relate that
Maharaja Ram Singh wanted to meet with her and sent her several messages
which the Bībī ignored. When the Maharaja was on his death bed, he again sent
some of his influential courtiers to persuade the Bībī to see him. Bībī Nawāzan
was not moved by any of these entreaties. The Maharaja passed away in 1880
and sometime later Bībī Nawāzan too left this world. She was buried in Bans
Badanpura near the takiyā of Shakir Shāh. Large number of devotees seeking
her blessings visit her shrine.413

410 Syed Ahmad Khan. 1293/1876. Āsāruʾs Sanādīd, (Chapter Four.). Lucknow: Maṭba‌ʾ Nawal
Kishore, p. 33.
411 Wāqiʿāt Dāru’l Ḥukūmat Dihlī (ḥiṣṣā duʾm), p. 404.
412 Maulawī Aḥmad Sāʿīd. 1354/1935. Tārīkh Awliyāʾ-i Dihlī maʿrūf ba Tuḥfa-i Sāʿīd.
Maḥbūbu’l-maṭābʿ Barqī Press, Dihlī, p. 146.
413 Shahid Aḥmad Jamālī. 2012. Tazkira Awliyāʾ i Rajasthan. Jaipur: Faiẓ Ahmad, p. 195.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 431

(8)
Bībī Nūrbharī
Date: Unknown
Shrine: Bazar Naṣrpur, Thatta, Pakistan

Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām, completed in 1767 in three volumes by Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ

(1727–1788),414 is the first source giving a brief narrative—merely four lines—
about Bībī Nūrbharī (one filled with the Light), who belonged to the Dabbāgha
community.415 She probably lived in or around the city of Thatta (also spelt
Tatta) near Bazār Naṣrpur. Thatta at this time was a major centre of Islamic
scholarship until its decadence set in, first with the shifting of the capital from
Thatta to Hyderabad in 1768 by the Kalhoŕas, and later, following its occupa-
tion in 1843 by the English colonialists.416
Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ (d. 1788), a poet and historian whose contribution to the
history of Sindh remains matchless,417 eulogised Bībī Nūrbharī, describing her
as a majzūbā and a sālika and extoling her as kāmila-yi waqt (perfect [mystic]
of her time) and Rābiʿa-yi sānī (the second Rābiʿā [of Basra] of her age). Several
charismatic powers were associated with her. Her shrine remains a place of ref-
uge (maljāʾ) for those who seek her blessings. Qāniʿ does not give any chrono-
logical details about Bībī Nūrbharī.418

414 Ṭuḥfatu’l Kirām of Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ Ṭhattāwī is a family history of the Kalhoŕas by Mīr
ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ Thattawī commissioned by Ghulām ʿAlī Shāh ʿAbbāsī (1757–1772), the
Kalhoŕā ruler.
415 Dabbāghas are tanners or curriers by profession.
416 For an account of Thatta’s scholars and learning institutions, see Abu Zafar Nadwī. 1970.
Tārīkh-i Sindh. ῾Azamgarh: Matba‘ Ma‘arūf, Dāru᾽l-Muṣannifīn, pp. 369–379; for an intro-
duction to the history of Thatta, see, Patrick Heenan. 1996. ‘Tata,’ in Paul Schellinger
and Robert Salkin (Eds.) International Dictionary of Historic Places, vol. 5. 5. London:
Routledge, pp. 801–804; also ‘An account of the country of Sindh with remarks on the
state of society, the government, manners, and customs of the people’ by Captain James
M’Murdo in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, 1834, pp. 223–258.
417 For the contributions of Qāniʿ, see Fatima Zahra Bilgrami. 1991. “Mir Ali Sher Thattavi’s
life and contributions to the history and culture of Sind”. Proceedings of the Indian History
Congress. 52: 322–331.
418 Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ Ṭhattāwī. 1304/1887. Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām, jild som Dehli: Matbaʿ Nāṣirī,
p. 157; ῾ʿIjāzu’l Ḥaqq Quddūsi has borrowed Bībī Nūrbharī’s account from Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām
in Tazkira-i Ṣūfiyya‌ʾ-i Sindh. Karachi: Urdu Academy (1959), p. 336.
432 Chapter 10

(9)
Bībī Rāstī
Period: Late Thirteenth and Early Fourteenth Centuries
Place: Uchch, Pakistan

Bībī Rāstī was the daughter of Khwāja Yaḥyā Kabīr, a Suhrawardī Sufi, a disciple
of Jalālu’d-Dīn Bukhārī of Uchch (d. 1384),419 and was married to Khwāja Wais
Sarwānī. Describing her mystical merits, Niʿmatu’llah al-Harāwī, the author of
Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī (completed in 1612), writes about the
four major signs of mystical virtues of Bībī Rāstī, namely, that she was ṣāḥib-i
lafz (one who could make predictions), majzūb (the one captivated by God),
mūlah (sad and grieving), and was perpetually absorbed and totally immersed
in Allāh (dāʾīm istighrāq tamām dāsht). Most of the time, she remained over-
powered by her mystical state (maghlū’l ḥāl būd). Thus, totally and completely,
she was not interested in worldly affairs (muhimmāt-i dunyawī).420
Khwāja Wais Sarwānī, because of his dislike of his wife’s state, after some
time married the daughter of a silk-thread trader but kept it a secret from the
trader as well as from Bībī Rāstī. When the secret was divulged, it did not make
even the smallest change in the Bībī’s way of life. Her husband went away to
live in Lahore and from there he sent a costly Iraqi horse to Bībī Rāstī, telling
her to look after it and to keep it healthy and fat. Bībī Rāstī was so engrossed
in Allāh’s remembrance (mashghūl-i ḥaqq) that a horse could not distract her
attention. When news of the horse’s failing health reached Wais Sarwānī, he
transferred it to the stable of his second wife who began to take good care of
the horse. One day when Bībī Rāstī visited her own stable and noticed that the
horse was not there, she asked about it. When she was told the whole story and
about Wais Sarwānī’s directions to keep the horse fit and healthy, Bībī Rāstī
said, “Khwāja Wais wants me to keep his horse fat ( farbih); however, I see it in a
dunghill, grazing a leafless branch of a palm tree.” As soon as these words came
out of her mouth, the horse quit eating and began striking its head against the
wall. All efforts to make it eat grass or grain failed. It would thrust its head into
a dunghill and its condition changed into that of a donkey. After a few days, the
horse was found lying dead in the dunghill.

419 Khwāja Niʿmatu’llah bin Khwāja Ḥabību’llah al-Harāwi’s Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa

Makhzani, pp. 723–40.
420 Ibid, pp. 826–27; also, Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fols. 127a & 128b.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 433

Concluding his brief account, Niʿmatu’llah comments that several similar

miraculous tales of Bībī Rāstī are narrated.

10.9 Sufi Girl-Children

(1)
Chimnī Bī Ṣāḥiba
Period: Fifteenth Century
Place: Gulbarga Sharīf, India

A hagiographical story of the mystical feats of five-year-old Chimnī Bī

Ṣāḥiba421 is given in Armughān-i-Sulṭānī, al-maʿrūf sair-i-Gulbarga by Maulawī
Muḥammad Sulṭān.422 Chimnī Bī, whose actual name was Fāṭima, was the
daughter of Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Khwānd Mīr Junaidī (d. 934/1528), a Sufi of great
charismatic powers (ṣāḥib-i karamat) who was a perfect friend of Allāh (walī
mukammal) and remained lost in meditation, contemplation (murāqaba),
and prayers.423 According to popular legends, once Chimnī Bī happened to
see her father, Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Khwānd Mīr, suspended in the air (muʿallaq) in
his state of ecstasy (wajd) during murāqaba. Without knowing what her father
was doing, she pulled her father’s robe to draw his attention towards her.
Sensing some disruption, Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Khwānd Mīr, who was lost in medita-
tion, angrily uttered, “Who are thou (tū kaun hai)! Go, get away ( jā dūr ho) and
be dead (mar jā).” Hearing this, Chimnī Bī, was much grieved. She ran to her
grandfather Ḥaẓrat Khwajā Shaikh Abu᾽l Faẓl Junaidī’s (d. 840/1436) grave to
seek some solace. There, she cried a lot and prayed and ordered the Earth to
split because she wished to enter into her (shaqq ho, main tujh main samāti
hūṅ). As soon she uttered these words, a breach in the Earth appeared and
suddenly Chimnī Bī was buried under the earth; a part of her red headscarf
that she was wearing, and which was prepared for her recently held Bismillah
ceremony,424 was left showing. In the meantime, Shaikh Khwānd Mīr came out

421 Little girls are often affectionately called Chimnī or Chumnī which is a local word for
dolls, mostly rag dolls.
422 Armughān-i Sulṭānī, pp. 162–63.
423 Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Khwand Mīr Junaidī was the grandson of the celebrated Sufi, Ḥaẓrat
Khwajā Shaikh Abu’l Faẓl Junaidī who died in 840/1436. Some scholars give this date as
850/ 1446, Ibid., pp. 161–62.
424 Bismillah is a ceremony held for a child at the age of four years, four months, and four days
and marks the start of formal education.
434 Chapter 10

of his trance and looked around for his daughter. A servant found the scarf bur-
ied and, realising what might have happened to the child, informed the father.
Nothing could be done now, except mourning the loss. The father built her
grave over the same spot where the earth had swallowed her.425 Muḥammad
Sulṭān, writing in 1924, says that it is customary in the area that people make
supplications in her name and offer sweetened bread and sweet drinks
(sherbet) in her memory at her shrine, especially on the occasions of Bismillah
ceremony of children.426

(2)
Daughter of Saiyyid Shāh Jamāl Baghdādī Wārangalī
Period: Late Sixteenth Century
Place: ʿUrs, Qāẓipura village, Warangal, India

ʿAbdu’l Jabbār Khan Mulkapurī gives a minor reference to an unnamed child,

the daughter of Saiyyid Shāh Jalālu’d-Dīn Jamālu’l-Baḥar Mʿashūq-i Rabbānī
Baghdādi Wārangalī (died on 22 Rajab 999/15 May 1591), popularly remem-
bered by his devotees with great reverence and affection as Mʿāshūq Rabbānī.
Saiyyid Shāh Jamāl Baghdādī’s lineage is traced to the great Sufi Ḥaẓrat Shaikh
ʿAbdu’l Qādir Jilānī. Narrating numerous miracles and charismas of Mʿāshūq
Rabbānī and of his vast travels, most of them based on hagiography and local
legends, Malkapurī writes that as soon as Mʿāshūq Rabbānī observed his two
young sons publicly displaying their miraculous powers, they both passed away
at his command, as he did not approve of Sufis who disclosed their secrets.427
Similarly, once while his young daughter was combing her hair, women of the
household watched as suddenly motiā and chambelī flowers began to fall down
from her hair. Mʿāshūq Rabbānī, who also witnessed this miracle, at once said
to her, “Depart from this world, now.” As soon as these words were uttered, the
little daughter passed away.428
The three children of Mʿāshūq Rabbānī lie buried in his shrine in the vil-
lage of ʿUrs (now known as Qāẓipura village, about five miles away from the

425 Armughān-i Sulṭānī, pp. 162–63.

426 Salim Chaoush, 1354/1935. Ḥālāt jamīʿ u’l awliyāʾ-i ṣaliḥīn Gulbarga Sharīf. Hyderabad:
Nizāmīyya Paoti Press, p. 14.
427 Muḥammad Sulṭān. 1326/1908. Waqāiʿ Warangal. Hyderabad: Maṭbaʿ Dāru’l Tābʿ.
pp. 50–53; Barakātu’l Awliyāʾ, pp. 168–169; Maḥbūb zil-manan-Tazkira Awliyāʾ yi dakan,
pp. 245–49.
428 Maḥbūb zil-manan-Tazkira Awliyāʾ yi dakan. Ḥissā awwal, p. 248; also, Waqāiʿ Warangal,
pp. 50–53.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 435

Warangal city). The shrine, along with the graves of the children, is maintained
by waqf grants.429

(3)
Māʾī Fāṭima Mastūiʾn
Period: Late Seventeenth Century
Shrine: Katkar, Dera Ghazi Khan, Pakistan

There is a miracle story of a little baby crying in her crib who turned into a
friend of Allāh by the luminous gaze of Ḥaẓrat Sulṭān Bāhū (d. 1691),430 a
mystical poet and founder of the Sarwarī Qādirī Sufi silsila. This is the story
of Fāṭima Mastūiʾn. It is said that once Sultan Bāhū, who used to travel from
village to village and never settled down in any Khānqāh, arrived along his fel-
low travelling dervishes at a village named Chabri, close to Kakar near a small
town of Fatah Khan in Dera Ghazi Khan. To get something to eat, they came
to the residence of a dāʾī (a wet nurse/midwife) and asked her to cook some
food for them. As her baby was crying in the crib due to some eye infection, she
asked them to help her in setting the fire for cooking. As the other dervishes
were busy helping her, Sultan Bāhū went to the crib, sat by the baby, and gazed
at her. The baby not only stopped crying but also her whole being was trans-
formed, her face glowed, and each part of her body echoed with the Sufi zikr,
Allāh hū. The news spread throughout the village, and all those who came to
see her fell under the spell of Allāh hū.431
Some say that she came to be known as Mastūiʾn as the word means “the one
who has absorbed.” Others argue that as she belonged to the Mastoiʾ tribe of
the Balochs, that was the origin of her name. The fame of Fāṭima Mastūiʾn soon
spread. Seekers of Truth thronged to the little-known village to seek the bless-
ings of this majzūbā. Kausar writes that the Makhdūms of Mahesar in Sindh
and Baluchistan were blessed by her.432

429 The brief biography of HadratMashooqRabbani Warangal | Sheikh.

https://www.scribd.com/…/The-brief-biography-of-Hadrat-Mashooq-Rabbani-Warang.
430 Biographical Encyclopaedia of Sufis: South Asia, pp. 367–75.
431 Makhzan-ul-Asrār-o-Sultan-ul-Aurad (mohrasharif.com—Mukhzan-ul-Asrar-o-Sultan-ul
-Aurad) www.mohrasharif.com/index.php/al…/270-mukhzan-ul-asrar-o-sultan-ul-aura.
432 Inʿām ul-Ḥaq Kausar. 1986. Tazkira Ṣūfiyya‌ʾ-yi Balochistan. Lahore: Urdu Science Board,
p. 121.
436 Chapter 10

10.10 Sufi Women’s Khānqāh

(1)
Minnat-Ullah Bībī Ṣāḥiba
Date: D. 28 Zilḥajj 888/26 January 1484
Khānqāh: Bidar, Karnataka, India

Within the khānqāh complex of Saiyyid Muḥammad bin Yusuf al-Ḥusainī,

popularly known as Ḥaẓrat Khwāja Bandā Nawāz Gīsū Darāz (d. 1422), are two
khānqāhs—the baŕī khānqāh (the big khānqāh) and the chotī khānqāh (the
small khānqāh). Northwest of the chotī khānqāh stands the khānqāh, “the
everlasting abode of divine grace,” of Minnat-Ullah Bībī Ṣāḥiba. Minnat-Ullah
Bībī was Khwāja Bandā Nawāz’s great-granddaughter, i.e., his daughter Bībī
Khwānja Batūl Khātūn and her husband Saiyyid Salār Lahori’s eldest daughter.
According to an inscription found in the khānqāh, Yad Ullāh Shāh, aka
Qabūlā Ḥusainī, the spiritual guide of Sulṭān ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn Aḥmad Bahmani
(1436–1458), built it.433 Later, in 1108/1696, his son Min Allāh Shāh renovated it.
Yazdani refers to a local tradition which says that Minnat-Ullah Bībī Ṣāḥiba was
the sister of Ḥaẓrat Abu’l-Faiẓ (d. 879/1474), a grandson of Khwāja Gīsū Darāz.434
An inscription in Persian on one of the walls, on a black stone slab, estab-
lishes not only the historicity of Minnat-Ullah Bībī Ṣāḥiba but also reflects her
spiritual attainments. The inscription says:

In the beginning this monastery by the grace of God was built by

Yad-Ullah, the king of faith,
Afterwards it was renovated by Min-Allāh Shāh, the son of [lit. the apple
of the eye] of Walī Ullāh Shāh,
When I enquired of Wisdom regarding the chronogram, it said [that it
was contained in the phrase], “the everlasting abode of divine grace.”

Yazdani, transcribing this inscription, says that according to the abjad sys-
tem, which helps determine dates and chronologies according to the numbers
assigned to each Arabic/Persian alphabet, the date is 1108/1696, the closing
decade of Aurangzeb’s rule.435

433 Tārīkh Muḥammadīya. Hyderabad: Baldha‌ʾ (1911) (author’s name lost), pp. 107–9. For
a strange story of the height of ecstasy that Yad Ullah Shāh experienced on seeing the
reflection of her bride’s face in the mirror and died, see Rizvi, Saiyd Athar Abbas. A History
of Sufism in India. Vol. 1, p. 256.
434 Bidar, its History and Monuments, p. 13.
435 Ibid, p. 113; also, Tārīkh-i Muḥammadīya p. 109.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 437

10.11 Sufi Women Who Preferred Death to a Life of Dishonour

(1)
Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ
Shrine: Gaŕhī Shāhū, Lahore, Pakistan
ʿUrs: 7–9 Jamādi-us Sanī

At the shrine of Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ (the pious/virtuous ladies) in Lahore, facts

and fiction, myth and religious fervour come to full bloom.436 To the large
crowd of men and women devotees who assemble here each day of the week,
it is devotion and not historic facts that make them bow their heads in rever-
ence before the altar of the shrine.
Ghulām Sarwar Lahorī argues that the shrine of Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ existed
in 441/1049 in Lahore when Saiyyid ʿAlī Hujwīrī arrived there. Without citing
any reference, Lahorī claims that Saiyyid ʿAlī Hujwīrī, to pay his homage to the
virtuous women, used to visit the shrine barefooted.437 Among the various leg-
ends about the shrine’s sanctity, one associates it with the descendants of the
Prophet’s family through Ḥaẓrat ʿAlī, the Prophet’s cousin, son-in-law, and the
fourth Pious Caliph (656–661). According to this legend, the shrine contains
the remains of six pious women of the family of Ḥaẓrat ʿAlī who are named
Bībī Tāj, Bībī Ḥūr, Bībī Nūr, Bībī Gauhar, and Bībī Shāhbāz, and together are
known as Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ. According to this legend, these pious women
accompanied Imām Ḥusain, the Prophet’s grandson, when he left Madina to
march towards Kūfa. On the ninth of Muḥarram, when Imām Ḥusain, in view
of the impending tragedy that happened the next day at Karbala, and his con-
cern for the safety of his female relatives, asked these women to leave his camp
and go away. They argued against it saying how could they desert him in a time
of conflict. An emotional dialogue ensued between these pious women and
Imām Ḥusain, in which they beseeched him not to ask them to leave, other-
wise how they would face Bībī Fāṭima, the Prophet’s daughter, on the Day of
Judgement. Finally, at his urgent suggestion, they left for India.438
They arrived at Lahore and encamped near a mound, which later came to be
known as their khānqāh. Around this deserted place dwelt a small local com-
munity. The chieftain of the area ordered his astrologers to find out why the

436 For these legendry accounts, see Ḥadīqat u’l Awliyāʾ: pp. 235–236; Kanhayya Lal, Munshi.
1977. Tārīkh-i Lahore. Lahore: Majlis-i tarqqqi-yi adab [First published in 1884], pp. 159–
163, 580.
437 Ghulām Sarwar Lahorī. 1877. Tārikh-i Makhzan-i Panjāb. 1877, Lucknow: Nawal Kishore
Press, p. 525.
438 Muḥammad Laṭif Malik. Awliyāʾ-yi Lahore. Lahore: Urdu Press, (1962.), pp. 94–101.
438 Chapter 10

leaping flames in their sacred fireplaces went cold suddenly by the presence
of these women. In addition, whoever went near where the five women were
encamped embraced Islam, influenced by the virtues of the Bībīs. Enraged, the
Raja marched towards the Bībīs with the intention of harming them. As he got
closer, the Bībīs prayed to Allāh for their safety and honour, imploring that the
earth should open up and swallow them. Their prayer was granted. The earth
swallowed them all, leaving behind only a part of their scarf. (Ghulām Sarwar
Lahorī and Pīr Ghulām Dastgīr Nāmī rejected this narrative and gave a differ-
ent account.)439
Another legend describes these pious women as the daughters of Saiyyid
Aḥmad Tokhtah Tirmizī (d. 602/1205), one of the early migrant Sufis who
arrived in Lahore along with his six daughters and settled there. According to
this narrative, Tokhtah Tirmizī, arrived first in Kech, Makrān, which is in the
southern part of Balochistan. He got his two elder daughters, Bībī Ḥājj and
Bībī Tāj, married soon; the other four, Bībī Ḥūr, Bībī Nūr, Bībī Gauhar, and
Bībī Shāhbāz, died unmarried. Bībī Ḥājj was married to the son of the ruler
of Makrān.440 Another legend says that all these sisters, to escape from the
hands of the soldiers of the invading Mongol army, prayed to Allah to pro-
tect their honour. The earth then opened and swallowed them. Nūr Aḥmad
Chishtī, another scholar, gives further details in the context of the first legend.
He says that the pious women of the family of Ḥaẓrat ʿAlī were good scholars
as well, especially Bībī Hajj (whom he also identifies as Bībī Ruqayya), who also
instructed men.441 Chishtī also mentions the name of Bībī Ḥalīma, daughter of
Ḥaẓrat Masʿūd Quraishi, a descendant of Haẓrat Ismāʿīl Zabiḥ Allāh. This lady,
a pious and devoted person, also had come along with the pious daughters of
ʿAqīl. As she used to bake bread for them, she came to be known as Bībī Tanūrī
(the woman of the clay oven).442

10.11.1 Observations of My Visit to the Shrine of Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ

In February 2016, I spent three days at the shrine of Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ in
Lahore and managed to take some photographs and make a short video as well.
Situated in Garhi Shāhū, near the Lahore railway station, the shrine is visited by
a large number of devotees representing a cross-section of Pakistanis coming

439 Ḥadīqat-ul Awliyāʾ, pp. 107–8; Pīr Ghulām Dastgīr Nāmī. Buzurgān-i-Lahore. (Nūrī Book
Depot, Lahore: 1966), pp. 193, 242–44.
440 For further details, see Muḥammad Iqbal Mujaddidī, 2013. Tazkira ʿulāmāʾ wa mashāʾikh
Pak wa Hind. Vol. 1. Lahore: Progressive Books, pp. 591–92.
441 Nūr Aḥmad Chishtī Lahorī. 1927. Taḥqiqāt-i Chishtī. Lahore: Matbaʿ Koh-i nūr. (First pub-
lished in 1867), pp. 159–162; 580–581.
442 Ibid, p. 162.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 439

from distant parts of the country. Some were encamping there in nearby loca-
tions for several days.
Entry to the dargāh is under tight security. Visitors have to walk a distance
of about one-and-a-half kilometres and are bodily searched at three spots
along the way. Identity cards are checked; cameras are not allowed, though cell
phones are. The walkway leading to the shrine is lined on both sides with shops
and vendors selling fresh flowers, rose petals, incense sticks, sweetmeats, and
shiny green sheets of fabric embossed in gold colours with passages from the
Qurʾān. One will also find tiny wooden cribs, ʿalams,443 and metal lockets and
chains for making oblations to the shrine. Special motichoor laddūs (a popular
ball-shaped sweetmeat) with a ring affixed to its top were sold outside and were
heaped inside the shrine on each of the graves for the devotees to take free of
cost for the baraka. To each ring a small slip of paper with prayers written on
it was attached. The main entrance to the shrine was thronged by the shrine
visitors (zāiʾrīn) who were putting oil into the earthen lamps and anointing
their and their children’s hands, heads, and faces—including the newborns—
with the oil of these lamps. Nearby, other devotees were tying each laddū kept
around the graves, saying, “Whosoever would pick up one laddū for mannat,
his or her wish (murād) would surely be fulfilled. After picking one laddū, place
back fourteen laddūs, fourteen rings and coloured threads to a latticed wall to
make oblations (mannat).”
Devotees, both men and women, are not allowed to enter the actual grave
area of the shrine. The zāʾirīn kiss the windowsill opening into the graves’ cell
and throw rose petals through the window onto the graves, and some even do
prostration. I saw an elderly woman on the other side of the window handing
blessed threads (mannat ke dhāge) to mothers who were tying them around
the necks of their children for healing and cure. Inside the mazār cell, women
were reciting sura yāsīn (Qurʾān: 36); some were offering ṣalāt. Around the
tombs were kept small bowls filled with salt. I observed women taking a pinch
of this salt and licking it; some wrapped the salt in a piece of paper and tied
it in their scarves to take home for blessings. Right in the centre of the mazār
an ‘alam was fixed to a stone grinding wheel (chakki) and the devotees were
making seven circumambulations around it. Women in groups were recit-
ing nauḥas (lamentations), crying and hitting their chest in matam (mourn-
ing). I observed that at intervals of half an hour or so, women would stand up,
chanting yā Ḥasan, yā Ḥusain and doing matam. One woman told me that the

443 The ʿalams are replicas of Imam Ḥusain’s standards, ceremoniously set up in the religious
assembly halls, called Imāmbārgahs.
440 Chapter 10

Figure 17 Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ Gaŕhī Shāhū, Lahore

Figure 18 Motichoor laddūs (a popular ball-shaped sweetmeat) with a ring affixed to its top,
Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ, Gaŕhī Shāhū, Lahore
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 441

ʿurs of the Bībīs is not celebrated as celebration of ʿurs of women Sufis is not
permissible.
A woman visiting the shrine from Azad Kashmir told me that as due to the
barkat of the Bībīs her wish had been granted (she did not tell me about the
wish), she placed her six gold bangles in the green box kept in the shrine for
collecting nazrāna (offerings) from the shrine visitors. I managed to have a
brief exchange with the mutawallī of the shrine who told me that the daily
income from the shrine was between two and three hundred thousand rupees
which, compared to the high cost of gold of six bangles, is far below the esti-
mated amount of the daily income as quoted by the shrine’s caretaker.

(2)
Ḥaft ʿAfīfa (Seven Virtuous Ladies)/sattioṅ jo āstāno (Shrine of the Virtuous
Women)
Shrine: Thatta, Pakistan
ʿUrs: 19–20 Safar

Unlike most other Sufi and pious women of Sindh who are forgotten, Ḥaft ʿAfīfa,
or the seven virtuous women (sisters), are remembered with great devotion
until today. Two eighteenth-century male authors of Sindh’s history immor-
talised the tale narrating an incredible story of these seven young, unmar-
ried sisters who preferred death to a life of dishonour and thus have valorised
and sanctified the belief that for women death is better than an unchaste life.
Today, sattioṅ jo āstāno (the shrine of the chaste women) is a popular place of
visitation by local devotees.
Tuḥfatu’l-kirām (Gift of the noble), a family history of the Kalhoŕa dynasty,
completed in 1767–1768 by Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qānīʿ (1727–1 788), is the first source
for the study of these seven sisters. Qānīʿ gives a short account of seven inno-
cent daughters (dukhtar māʿsūma) under the subheading az ʿajāʾibāt Sāmūʾi
khasf haft dukhtarān (from the wonders of Samui—eclipse of seven virgin
daughters).444 Expanding the story, Qānīʿ writes, “There were seven beautiful
(malīḥ), chaste (῾iffat) young girls of the family of the Soomra and by nature (sar-
isht) were ascetic (tāriku’d-Dunyā) and God worshipping (khudā parast). All the
time, they remained busy in remembering God. Frightened by the tyranny of the
people, they, like the Aṣḥāb-i kahf, were living a life of solitary confinement.”445

444 Samui, situated about three miles north-west to Thatta, under the Makli hills, was the
capital of the Samma dynasty of Sindh. For a brief introduction, see Albert William
Hughes. 1874. A Gazetteer of the Province of Sind. London: G. Bell.
445 Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qānīʿ Thattawī. 1887. Tārikh-i Nāyāb˗ Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām, jild som, Dehli:
Maṭba῾ Nāṣirī. pp. 182.
442 Chapter 10

Meanwhile when Saiyyid Yaʿqūb Mashhadī,446 with all the grandeur and
splendour of a Shaikh (karr-u- farr-i-mashīkhat), passed by this area, the seven
sisters came under his refuge (ba-amān) and began living in Samui. There was
no respite for them there as well. Soon, a gang of the rich of the area came after
them. As these girls were not willing [to accept their proposal], these men of
wealth sent soldiers to capture them. Thus, one morning, just before sunrise,
as it was their custom (bā rasm-i maʿhūd), they reached the embankment (bar
lab-i daryā) for taking a bath. These adversaries (ḥarifān) arrived and began
insisting [to accept the proposal]. Shaikh Jundhi Patni,447 by his charismatic
powers came to know of their condition and at once rescued them from the
clutches of these rogues and miraculously took them away to the other bank
of the river. The soldiers followed them there. As there is no respite and shelter
for the helpless, except that of God, Qānīʿ observes that, therefore these chaste
women lamented to God (bā dargāh-i khudā nalīdā) to hide them. The earth
then opened up and swallowed all the seven. Since then, the place where the
earth swallowed these pious girls has become a ziyārat-gāh (place of pilgrim-
age) for all.448
After a lapse of some thirteen years, following Tuḥfatu’l-kirām, another cel-
ebrated chronicler, Shaikh Muḥammad ʿĀzam Thattawī, in 1194/1780 in his
Persian work Tuḥfatu’l-ṭāhirīn (A present of the chaste ones), added more infor-
mation about these ascetic sisters. In a section entitled ‘dar zikr awliyāʾAllah ki
dar sawād-i baldah āsūdund (in re membrance of friends of God who repose in
the suburbs of the city), he writes about the Seven Sisters of Thatta under the
heading zikr ḥaft ʿafīfā ki bā iṣṭilāḥ inās “sattioṅ” goyand (an account of seven
virtuous [females] called chaste women).449

446 According to Qāniʿ, Saiyyid Yaʿqūb Mashhadī, a person of excellent piety and virtues,
along with his brother and riding a lion, arrived in Sindh from Mashhad in 901 H and died
in 922 H. See Tārikh-i Nāyāb˗ Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām, jild som, pp. 191–92.
447 Shaikh Jundha Patni was said to be a Mahdawi who because of the prayers of the
Seven Chaste Sisters attained great acclamation as a Sufi. For more, see Tārikh-i Nāyāb˗
Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām, jild som, p. 184.
448 Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām, jild som, p. 182.
449 Inās “sattion” is a combination of two words, Arabic and Sindhi. Inās means females and
sattioṅ is a derivation of the Sanskrit word sati, meaning a virtuous wife and not as erro-
neously understood to mean widow burning. For further information, see John Stratton
Hawley. 1994. Sati, the blessing and the curse: the burning of wives in India. New York:
Oxford University Press; Shaikh Muḥammad ʿᾹzam Thattawī. Tuḥfat u’l-ṭahirīn. (Edited
by Badr-i Alam Durrani). Karachi: Sindhi Adabi Board, 1956, pp. 175–176.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 443

ʿĀzam Thattawi’s story identifies the soldiers pursuing the chaste sisters
to achieve clandestine motives as the soldiers of Sulṭān ʿAlāu’d-Dīn Khaljī
(d. 1316).450 While the Sultan’s army pursued the family members of the Sumra
ruler who were running to seek shelter, these seven sisters lost their way. Seeing
the pursuing army of the Sultan approaching them, the chaste sisters got ter-
rified and sought Allāh’s blessings to protect their honour (āṅ pākdāmanāṅ
bākhudā rujuʿ). At that moment something strange, not witnessed before, hap-
pened with the Blessings of God’s Eminent Glory. The earth split and all the
sisters who were a bouquet of chastity (guldastā-i ʿiffat) were swallowed by the
earth (dar ḥāl ba-qudrat badīʾul-ʿajāʾib jalla jalājalahū zamīn az ham munfarij
gardīd). When the horse-riding soldiers came close, they were surprised to see
only the edges of the girls’ headscarves (miqnaʿ). Astonished at what the pur-
suing horse riders watched from a distance, they said, “certainly these veiled
females were divinely ordained (ṣāḥib-i-tawfīq) and were believing women
(khudāwand-i taḥqīq).” The place where this happened is called Samui, the
first capital of the Sumra, a few miles north of Thatta. Women pilgrims visit
this place of women who are honoured as having the virtues of Bībī Ḥaẓrat
Maryam (Maryam ṣifatāṅ) and get their wishes (murād) granted.451 This narra-
tive does not mention the help provided by the two eminent male Sufis to the
seven sisters while they were in distress.
Mirzā Mehdi Shirāzī in 1888 wrote a compendium of women’s short biogra-
phies selected from almost all the Muslim lands. In the long list of women of
prominence, the last entry is about Haft ʿAfīfa. The account repeats the above
two narratives with no credit to the earlier authors.452
On my visit to the graves of the seven sisters in January 2016, another version
of the story was narrated by the khalīfa of the graves. He told me that these girls
were first married to the Qurʾān, and later on they achieved ʿirfān and attained
spiritual states. Another legend that I heard during my visit was that actually
the seven sisters were not seven but were nine in number. Two of them had

450 Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ also says that Samui was ruined by the invading armies of the Sultan,
See Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām, jild som, p. 182.
451 Tuḥfatu’l-ṭāhirīn, 176; Naʿīmī, Muḥammad Iqbāl Ḥusain. 1987. Tazkira-i awliyā-yi Sindh.
Karachi: Shāriq Publications, p. 214.
452 Mirzā Mehdi Shirāzī. 1889. Kitāb-i Tazkirat ʾal-khwātīn dar Sharaḥ-i ḥāl-i mashāhīr-i
niswān-i ʿālam az ʿArab wa Rūm wa Hind wa ʿAjam az ṣadr-i Islām tā kunūn mushtamal
bar awṣāf-i ḥamīda wa ṣifāt-i pasandīda ʿānhā wa ʿash‘ārī ki dar ʿArabī wa Fārsī wa Turkī
guftahand. (Place of publication not known, probably Bombay), p. 165.
444 Chapter 10

wings and therefore were called parioṅ (fairies) and were buried separately
at the shrine of Shāh parioṅ (the noble fairies) in Makli, while the remain-
ing seven were buried at this dargāh. A grave lying across the graves of the
Seven Sisters is said to be that of their brother. Women are prohibited to attend
this grave. On the ʿurs day and on nauchandi evenings (the first Thursday of a
lunar month), large crowds of men and women along with children and tod-
dlers arrive to pay homage to the shrine of the sattioṅ, make supplications,
and offer flowers, sweetmeat, and cash. Those whose wishes are granted offer
home-raised live fowl. In tabarruk blessed articles, such as food, flowers, and
incense sticks are distributed free of cost among the pilgrims, the mujāwir
(shrine attendant) distributes blessed oil for anointing, dust of the graves, and
flower petals among the shrine visitors. Occasionally some well-to-do persons
also give rice cooked with meat in langar (free food).
Two weeks following my first visit to sattioṅ jo āstāno, I returned to Thatta
and Makli in the last week of January 2016. This time I wanted to meet the
women khalīfa of the shrine. I had asked someone in Thatta to make sure that
these women were present. I also requested that the Khalīfa women should
not be informed about my visit. On arriving at the shrine, we were told by one
woman khalīfa not to visit the shrine in the fashion of tourists who visit the
shrine for sightseeing or for collecting information. Shrines must be visited, she
warned me, only to pay respect to the awliyāʾ Allāh buried there. One woman,
who refused to introduce herself, glared at me and asked me why I kept coming
there as I was neither making a baʿit nor any mannat. After some negotiations,
which involved the transaction of paltry cash, her temper cooled down. She
told me that there were at least five families “running” the dargāh as ancestral
custodians and were responsible for its safe management. The women khalīfa
belonged to the Aṣḥābī silsilā and also perform bʿait for women. These khalīfa
also hold the key to the cash box. An average daily income of the shrine is
about Rs. 300, which is spent on the routine upkeep of the shrine. One of these
khalīfa also said that the present dargāh was built by a Hindu. All these women
did not allow me to take their pictures.
A shrine dedicated to the sattioṅ of Thatta and known locally as sattioṅ jo
āstāno exists in Karachi within the shrine complex of Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh for the
benefit of those women devotees who cannot travel to Thatta to pay homage.
In one of my earlier visits to the shrine of Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh, I interviewed the
woman who managed sattioṅ jo āstāno and also took her photo. She told me
that sattioṅ jo āstāno in Karachi was managed for women who cannot travel to
Thatta but want to benefit from the blessings of the sattioṅ.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 445

10.12 A Sufi Woman Who Wrote a Book of Instructions for the Sufis

(1)
Bebe Nekbakhta
Period: Sixteenth Century
Place: Bannu, Pakistan

Bebe Nekbakhta was a virtuous gnostic and learned (ʿārifa wa kāmila) daugh-
ter of Shaikh Allahdād of the Mumuza‌ʾī tribe of the Pashtūns living near
Ashnaghar (also called Hashtnagar), north of Peshawar. Her family had long
traditions of following the path of mysticism and religious learning. Her
grandfather was a known religious scholar. Muḥammad Hotak, the author
of Pata Khazana, the source of this biographical notice, says that his father,
Da‌ʾūd Khan, narrated that in Awliyāʾ-i Afghānī, a book written by Imāmu’d-Dīn
Ghoryāl, Shaikh Allahdād was a man of great saintly virtues and that his daugh-
ter, Bebe Nekbakhta, a gnostic (ʿārifa) by nature, studied theology (ʿulūm-i dīnī)
and spent her life in prayers and worshipping (ba-riyāẓat wa ʿibādat-i khudā)
and remained lost in Allāh’s remembrance. In 951/1544, Bebe Nekbakhta was
married to Shaikh Qadam, son of Khwāja Muḥammad Zāhid Khalīl Mathiza‌ʾī.453
Soon after the marriage, a daughter, named Ruqayyā, was born but died in
infancy. In 955/1549, a son, Shaikh Miyāṅ Qāsim Afghānī Qādirī, was born.
Muḥammad Hotak reverently describes Shaikh Miyāṅ Qāsim as the greatest
benefit to humanity and the pole star of the age (Ghawsuʾs zamān and Quṭb-i
daurān), whose fame spread to all parts of Hind.
On the authority of Imāmu’d-Dīn Ghoryāl and his own father, Da‌ʾūd Khan,
Hotak writes that in 969/1562, Bebe Nekbakhta wrote Irshādu’l Fuqarāʾ (direc-
tions for the right way for the ascetics), a valuable book of guidance in verse
form for the fuqarāʾ (Sufis who have voluntarily opted for poverty) and the
ʿibādu’llah (servants of Allāh). Muḥammad Hotak’s father had seen this book
while he was visiting Bannu, a town not far away from Peshawar, and recited
some of the verses from the book. Hotak cites some of these mystical verses
composed by the elegant (rangīn) Bebe Nekbakhta in the Pashtu language as

453 Shaikh Qadam had two wives. He had no children from his second wife. See Khwāja
Niʿmatu’llah bin Khwāja Ḥabību’llah al-Harāwi’s Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i
Afghānī, vol. 2, (Dhaka: Asiatic Society of Pakistan. 1962), p. 851; see also Pata Khazana
Original: https://archive.org › details › BPataKhazanaOriginal, p. 99. Hotak, Muḥammad,
ʿAbd al-Ḥayy Ḥabībī, and Khushal Ḥabībī. 1997. The Hidden treasure: a biography of
Pas̲htoon poets = Pat̲a k̲h̲azana. Lanham: University Press of America, pp. 138–39.
446 Chapter 10

counsel (naṣīḥat) for the people, addressing them as múmin (believer). Thus,
her addressees were primarily the Pashtun males. I have selected a few verses
to present here:

God bless you O believer

Be truthful in and out.
Pray only with sincerity
In faith do not have doubt.

Always seek God’s love

And serve in His way,
Stay away from sin
From virtue do not sway.

Leave this world aside

If you have any wisdom,
Go and seek eternity
In God’s sacred kingdom.454

These verses, compared to any other spiritual sermon with which we are famil-
iar and which usually are associated with male voices, are of unique signifi-
cance. Bebe Nekbakhta chose to spread her spiritual guidance not through
the spoken words in spiritual discourse sessions but through the medium of
written verses. This novel method was more suitable and effective, mainly
because it did not breach the traditional distancing between male and female
attendance at one place, a reality of the social life of most Muslim societies.
Additionally, it added more permanency to the message and ensured wider
outreach. The verses guide the reader to be sincere (ba-ikhlās). Like a true Sufi,
she exhorts her readers to know the foundational difference between the out-
ward (zāhir) and the inner (bāṭin) concept of the Reality (ḥaqq), thus ending
travel in this world by rejecting worldly lures and attractions (tark-i duniyā).
The traveller, however, warns Bebe Nekbakhta, should remain watchful of
God’s wrath (ghazab) caused by human wrongdoing and instead seek Allāh’s
Mercy (raḥm), practice offering thanks (shukr) for all His iḥsān (beautiful gifts)
and adopt patience (ṣabr) in all actions and thoughts.
It is worth noticing that as the book mostly had Pashtūn male readership,
and thus Bebe Nekbakhta, without sitting in a khānqāh or holding discourse
sessions, shared her wisdom with a large and unbounded audience. It is also

454 Translation from Muḥammad Hotak. ʿAbd al-Ḥayy Ḥabībī, and Khushal Ḥabībī. p. 139.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 447

significant that Bebe Nekbakhta’s Irshādu’l Fuqarāʾ is the only Sufi treatise on
record on the right way for the Sufis authored by a Sufi woman. The book did
not remain hidden from the male readers as is evidenced that Hotak’s father,
Da‌ʾūd Khan, not only read it but, after a lapse of several years, could quote it
with accuracy and passion too. In view of the year 1562, the year of its comple-
tion, Irshādu’l Fuqarāʾ predates all other works, whether Sufi texts or other,
written by women.

10.13 A Sufi Woman Who Wrote Sufi Biographies and about Her Own
Spiritual Journey

(1)
Jahān Ārāʾ Begam
Date: Safar 1023/1614–Ramaẓān 1092/1681
Shrine: Delhi, India

The narrative of Jahān Ārāʾ Begam presented here stands unique among Sufi
women discussed in this volume for two reasons: first, born into an imperial
household at a time when it was known for its fabulous wealth and treasures,
she sought the company of the Sufis; and second, she is the only Sufi woman
discussed in this volume who ever inscribed her own spiritual journey and an
account of male Sufis.
Jahān Ārāʾ Begam (1614–1681), the eldest and the favourite child of the
Mughal emperor Shāh Jahan (r. 1628–1658) and Mumtāz Mahal (d. 1040/1631)
of Iranian lineage, was born during the apex of Mughal glory when her father,
a favourite son of Emperor Jahangir, was busy in his Mewar expedition. With
the untimely demise of her mother, Mumtāz Mahal, the lady of the Taj, during
childbirth in 1040/1631, Jahān Ārāʾ Begam was destined to go through a tumul-
tuous life. With her father’s succession to the throne, she came to be addressed
by the august imperial title, Begam Ṣāḥib. She lies buried in the sanctuary of
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ in Delhi with this epitaph on her tomb:

Let naught but green grass grow over my grave.

For mortals’ poor turf alone is the cover.

Jahān Ārāʾ, like her younger brother Dārā Shikūh (1615–1659), had a deep yearn-
ing for seeking the Truth and followed the path of a spiritual seeker (sālik).
Among all pious women who are seekers of Truth and whose narratives are
included in this book, Jahān Ārāʾ is the only one to inscribe experiences of her
448 Chapter 10

spiritual journey. Tutored by Satīuʾn Nisāʾ (d. 1056/1640),455 who was endowed
with excellent learning in poetry, medicine, and the Qurʾān, Jahān Ārāʾ was well
trained in the art of writing. Inspired by her devotion as a sālik and equipped
with learning and writing skills, Jahān Ārāʾ produced two unique treatises on
South Asian Sufis which remain unmatched in their merit as being the only
two works authored by a woman on this subject. More importantly, these two
small tracts remain the only two hitherto known autobiographical narratives
of a pious woman’s spiritual journeying.456
At the age of twenty-six years, Jahān Ārāʾ, who never married, after carefully
consulting reliable works and treatises on taṣawwuf, extracted relevant mate-
rial (az kutub wa rasāʾīl muʿtabarā ba iḥtiyāṭ tamām bīrūn āwarda) and wrote in
1049/1639 Mūnisu’l-arwāh (Companion of the souls), a biographical compen-
dium (tazkira) of Chishtī Sufis.457 In her own words, she wrote Mūnisu’l-arwāh
because of her tremendous sincerity and devotion (kamāl-i ikhlās wa aʿqīdat)
for Khwāja Muʿīnu’d-Dīn Chishtī.458 After narrating the lives of Chishtī Sufis,
she describes her pilgrimage to the shrine of Khwāja Muʿīnu’d-Dīn Chishtī at
Ajmer, which is the first account of shrine visitation by a South Asian Muslim
woman known to exist.459 In Mūnisu’l-arwāh, Jahān Ārāʾ also refers to her dis-
cussions about Sufis and Sufism with her father, Shāh Jahan.
A little more than a year later, in 1051/1641, Jahān Ārāʾ completed another Sufi
treatise, Risāla-yi ṣāḥibiyya.460 In this tract, Jahān Ārāʾ narrates her association

455 Satīuʾn Nisāʾ was the eldest sister of Ṭālib Amuli (d.1626), poet laureate (maliku’l shuʿarāʾ).
For more about Satīuʾn Nisā, see Maulawī Maḥbūbur Raḥmān Kalīm. 1906. Jahān Ārāʾ
Begam. Aligarh: Maṭbʿ Aḥmadī, pp. 15–16; Rekha Misra. 1967. Women in Mughal India,
1526–1748. Allahabad: Munsihiram Manoharlal, pp. 227–238.
456 For biographies of Jahān Ārāʾ Begam, see Maulawī Maḥbūbur Raḥmān Kalīm. 1906.
Jahān Ārāʾ Begam. Aligarh: Maṭbʿ Aḥmadī; For her biography see, Qamar Jahan Begam.
1991. Princess Jahan Ara Begam: Her Life and Works. Karachi: S.M. Hamid Ali; Tahera
Azmat. 1970. ‘Jahan Ara,’ in Women Mentors of Men by Tahera Azmat, Ujjain: Siddhartha
Prakahan, pp. 67–77; Ẓiauddin Aḥmad Baranī. 1921. Jahan Ara Begam. Delhi: Ghani’l
maṭabʿ; Maḥbūbur Rahman. 1907. Jahan Ara: Shāh jahān bādshāh ki fāẓil beti. Aligarh:
Maṭbaʿ Faiz-i ʿĀm; Mirzā Muḥammad Wahid. 1953. ‘Great Muslim Women of India,’ in
Great Women of India (Edited) Swami Madhavnanda & Ramesh Chandra Majumdar.
Almora: Advait Ashrama, pp. 378–94; for allegations against her, see Sakul Kundra. 2014.
“Visiblizing” Women: French Travellers’ Memoirs and the Construction of Women of
Mughal India. Pakistan Journal of Women’s Studies: Alam-e-Niswan. 21(1): pp. 71–86.
457 Jahān Ārāʾ Begam 1891. Mūnisu’l-arwāḥ. Translated in Urdu as Muʿīnu’l-arwāḥ by Maulawī
Muḥammad ʿAbdus-Ṣamad Kalīm Qādirī. Dehli: Matbāʿ Rizvi, p. 43. Persian quote from
Maulawī Maḥbūbur Raḥmān Kalīm. 1906. Jahān Ārāʾ Begam, p. 18.
458 Quoted in Maulawī Maḥbūbur Raḥmān Kalīm. 1906. Jahān Ārāʾ Begam, p. 18.
459 Mūnisu’l-arwaḥ, pp. 43–44.
460 Jahān Ārāʾ Begam Risāla-yi ṣāḥibiyya with Persian text and Urdu and English translation
by Muhammad Aslam and Sardar Ali Ahmad Khan. Lahore: Ashraf Printing Press, 1993.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 449

with the silsila-yi Qādirīyyā and her devotion to Shaikh Mullā Shāh Badakhshī
(1585–1661).461 She introduces herself with great humility first as faqīrā, ẓa‌ʾīfa
wa ḥaqīrā naḥīfā (powerless, small and frail), and khādima awliyāʾ (slave of
the friends of Allāh) and later as the daughter of Emperor Shāh Jahan. With
dexterity of polished penmanship in highly ornate Farsi, the celibate Mughal
princess writes that Maulānā Shāh is the Quṭb-i waqt and Ghaws-i zamān (the
pole star of the age and the benefit of humanity) and could transform the seek-
ers (ṭālibān) from nothing to golden existence with his greatest elixir (iksīr-i
ʿĀẓam). She addresses him as wilāyat panāh (sanctuary of holiness), murshid-i
kāmil (perfect Master) and sarkhail ahl-i-hādi (commander of the people of
Allāh). To her, Maulānā Shāh was Murshid-i Kāmil, and ʿĀrif-i Rabbānī (the
perfect Master, and the Gnostic of the Divine).462 Jahān Ārāʾ, finally, pays her
greatest tribute to the charismatic powers of her mentor by saying that Ḥaẓrat
ʿĪsā revived the dead; Mullā Shāh always revived the dead hearts (murdagān-i
dil rā hameshā zindagi mī bakhshand).463
In a separate section in Risāla-i ṣāḥibiyya, under the heading zikr aḥwāl īṅ
ẓaʿīfā (an account of this lowly one), Jahān Ārāʾ briefly narrates various stages
of her spiritual journey.464 Recounting her journey, Jahān Ārāʾ writes that since
the age of twenty, despite her life as a princess, she had a sincere and strong
devotion for the Chishtī Sufis (Khwajgān-i Chisht) and entered the discipleship
with devotion of Khwāja Muʿīnu᾽d-Dīn Chishtī of Ajmer. Her devotion for the
Shaikh, she writes, increased each day since her visit to the shrine in Ajmer.465
She went through several experiences in search of the true path and met with
several Sufis. During this period, her brother Dārā Shikūh also guided her. At
the time of his departure for the Kabul expedition in 1049/1639, Dārā gave her a
copy of Nafahātu’l uns (written in 1478) of Mullā Jāmī (d. 1492). Jahān Ārāʾ was
so deeply influenced by the book that she took it as her constant companion,
kept it all the time with her, and read it.466
While journeying with her father to Kabul via Hasan Abdal (in Pakistan) in
1049/1639, Jahān Ārāʾ had another mystical experience, which finally changed
the course of her life. The quest to know the Truth led her to contact through

461 Mullā Shāh from Rustaq in Badakhshan arrived in Hindustan and became a disciple of
Ḥaẓrat Miāṅ Mīr of Lahore. For his biography and teachings, see Sulṭān Muḥammad Dārā
Shikūh Qādirī. Sakīnatu’l-awliyāʾ. Lahore: Nawal Kishore Steam Press. (n. d.), pp. 116–158.
462 Jahān Ārāʾ Begam Risāla-yi saḥibiyyā, p. 32.
463 Ibid, p. 15.
464 Ibid, pp. 18–33.
465 Ibid, p. 18.
466 Ibid, p. 19.
450 Chapter 10

her eunuchs (khwajāsarā) two Sufis—Shaikh Shāh Daulā of Gujrat, Punjab

(1581–1676),467 and Ḥājī ʿAbdu’llah, a recluse living in the neighbourhood of
Tāl Jalāl Ghakhar. From the first one, despite her request for blessings (iltimās
faiẓ), she could not receive what she was seeking.
Her contact with Ḥājī ʿAbdu’llah proved more fruitful. Not only did Ḥājī
ʿAbdu’llah accept her offerings (nazr) submitted through a eunuch, but he sent
her instructions for doing Allāh’s remembrance by zikr and tasbīḥ, along with
a prayer rug that he had made himself and two loaves of bread (nān).468 The
moment she swallowed a small piece of this loaf, she experienced purity of
heart which was filled with Light and she felt composure and the Presence of
the Divine (dar dil ṣafāʾī wa nūrī wa dar bāṭin jamʿīyat wa ḥuẓūrī yāftam). She
kept the bread for three days and shared it with her female attendants. Filled
with this new awakening, Jahān Ārāʾ went through deep internal transforma-
tion and experienced a strong quest for seeking the Truth (ṭalab-i ḥaqq).
Though now around forty years in age, Jahān Ārāʾ felt the weight of her
age and thought that her energy was ebbing away (quwwat-i zāhiri dar maʿraẓ
zawāl ast). She grew cold towards the world and its useless affairs. Realising
that Allāh is all-seeing and all-knowing, she repented (tawba mī bāyad kard)
and regretted what she had done in the past. She began offering prayers missed
earlier and also kept missed fasts ( faut shudā). Most of her time was now spent
in meditation and remembrance (bāzikr wa tasbīḥ) and in reading the lives of
Sufi Masters (muṭālaʿ aḥwāl-i mashāʾikh).469

467 An account of a meeting with Shāh Daulā Daryai is given by ʿAbdu’llah Kheshgi in his
Maʿāriju’l wilāyat (completed in 1683). Kheshgi writes that Shāh Daulā was of Afghānī
descent. See Maʿāriju’l wilāyat, MS no. R344 in the holdings of Punjab University (Lahore)
library, Iqbal Mujaddidī Collection (zakhīrā Iqbal Mujaddidī), fols. 431a & b; Wajihu’d-Dīn
Ashraf. Bahr-e-Zakhkhar, (vol. 3), pp. 121–122. Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf says that originally
Shāh Daulā Gujrati was from a Hindu princely family (az shahzadgān-hunūd); Ḥadīqatʾul
Awliyāʾ, p. 174; Gazetteer of the Gujrat District, 1883–84. Punjab Government, Lahore: The
Arya Press, p. 115; Mahomed Latif. 1896. ‘Dwarfs in the Punjab,’ in Linguistic and Oriental
Essays, vol. 1 written for the year 1840 to 1897 by Robert Needham Cust. London: Luzac & Co.
1898, p. 416. Elliott, Major A.C. ‘The Legend of Shāh Daula’ in Rose, H.A. 1919. A glossary
of the tribes & castes of the Punjab & North-west frontier province. Lahore: Printed by the
Superintendent, Government Printing, Punjab, pp. 631–637.
468 Ḥājī ʿAbdu’llah earned his livelihood by weaving prayer rugs. For the past thirty years,
Jahān Ārāʾ says that Ḥājī ʿAbdu’llah had not stepped out of his residence. Risāla-i ṣāḥibiyyā,
p. 21. The only other reference to Ḥāji ʿAbdu’llah is found in Dārā Shikūh’s Sakīnatu’l
Awliyāʾ. Ḥājī ʿAbdu’llah arrived in Kashmir from Lahore, and at the request of Dārā, Mullā
Shāh accepted to instruct him to perform zikr-i ilāhi. In a letter addressed to Dārā Shikūh,
Mullā Shāh wrote that he (Mullā Shāh) had accepted Ḥājī ʿAbdu’llah because of him. See
Sakīnatu’l Awliyāʾ, p. 137.
469 Risāla-yi ṣāḥibiyya, pp. 20–21.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 451

Later that same year, 1639, Jahān Ārāʾ came in contact with Mullā Shāh, a
disciple of Miyāṅ Mīr in Kashmir. Jahān Ārāʾ corresponded with Mullā Shāh470
and once even sent him bread and some vegetables that she had cooked her-
self. Before a meeting could be held between Mullā Shāh and Jahān Ārāʾ, the
princess found a way to communicate spiritually with her Master. She would
sit in front of a portrait of him, sketched by one of the court painters of Dārā,
and imagining his presence would meditate.471 One evening, Jahān Ārāʾ, after
taking a bath and donning ritually clean dress (libās-i pākīza), ate bahī (quince
fruit) sent to her by Mullā Shāh and sat down in the small mosque that she had
built for herself in her palace. She meditated till midnight, and after performing
tahajjud (midnight supererogatory prayer) retired to her bedchamber. There,
in a corner of her room facing the qibla, she began meditation by focussing her
attention on the picture of her spiritual teacher (shabīh ḥaẓrat-i murshid) and
visualising the company of the Prophet and his chosen companions (yārān-i
burguzīdā wa ṣaḥāba) and friends of Allāh (awliyāʾ Allāh).472 Describing her
gnostic experience, the first known one penned by a woman devotee, Jahān
Ārāʾ inscribes:

As soon as I focussed my first attention (man awwal mutāwajjuh shudam),

I experienced a state in which I was neither asleep nor awake (nā khwāb
būd nā bedārī) and beheld the sanctified assembly (majlis muqaddas) of
the Prophet and his companions and the great Friends of Allāh (awliyāʾ-yi
ʿuzzām). In this august assembly, Ḥaẓrat Akhund Ṣāḥib [i.e., Mullā Shāh]
was also there with his head placed at the holy feet of the Prophet. The
Holy Prophet said, “O’ Mullā Shāh! you have lighted the lamp of the house
of the Timurids” (Aye Mullā Shāh! tū chirāgh-i taimūriya rā roushan kardī).
Emerging from this state, my heart was gladdened with this tiding (dil-i
man azīn bishārat bāgh bāgh ba-shaguft) and prostrated in thanksgiving.473

Hearing the above from the blessed tongue of the Prophet, Jahān Ārāʾ realised
that none other from the house of Timur, but only she and her brother, Dārā,
had set on the path of Truth (bā-ṭalab rāh-i ḥaqq).474 Dārā, himself a disciple
of Mullā Shāh, confirmed the spiritual pursuits and attainments of Jahān Ārāʾ

470 Two letters of Mullā Shāh, written in response to Jahān Ārāʾ’s letters are included in
Sakīnatu’l Awliyāʾ, pp. 144–148.
471 Risāla-yi ṣāḥibiyya, p. 25.
472 Ibid. p. 25.
473 Ibid, p. 26.
474 Ibid, p. 27.
452 Chapter 10

and that she learned mashghūliyat at the hands of Mullā Shāh.475 In one of
the letters that Mullā Shāh addressed to Jahān Ārāʾ, Mullā Shāh directed her
to read and consider carefully two things, along with Dārā. First, “one who has
gained [access to] Allāh, needs nothing else,” and second, “doubts and ambi-
guities happen only because of deficiency in comprehension.”476 Mullā Shāh
also directed Jahān Ārāʾ to “value (qadr) your worthy brother. If he were not
there, you would not have the good fortune to have this wealth and blessings.
If you do not value him, how would you do mine [value]?”477
Inscribed in the luxurious imperial abodes of the Mughals, Risāla-yi
ṣāḥibiyya of Jahān Ārāʾ serves a double purpose. On one hand, it unveils the
self of the author, as all autobiographical narratives do; on the other, it made
public Jahān Ārāʾ’s communications with unrelated males which was a taboo
among the royal Mughals.
Jahān Ārāʾ’s life presents a curious combination of two opposites. On one
side, Jahān Ārāʾ was a princess, born in luxury and one who experienced the
taste of power meant for a queen consort and participated actively in the fierc-
est battles fought for the throne;478 on the other side, she yearned for the life of
a traveller on the path of a gnostic. These two opposites have made Jahān Ārāʾ
Begam the subject of great fascination for writers, including both Indian and
European. Some have praised her virtues; others have accused her of immoral-
ity. A contemporary Persian text, Dabistān-i mazāhib, completed a little after
1656 whose authorship is attributed to Muḥsin Fānī (d. 1670–1671),479 referred
to Jahān Ārāʾ in ornate Persian idioms such as Maryam-i rozgār (Mary of the
age), Fāṭima zamān (Fāṭima of the time), aʿṣār ʿiffat-i ʿunṣur (the root of purity
of the world), and ʿiṣmat paikar (model of chastity). It says that, driven by her
heart, she followed Mullā Shāh and thus turned towards the right direction.480

475 Sakīnatu’l Awliyāʾ, p. 144.

476 Ibid, p. 147.
477 Ibid, p. 147.
478 She wrote several significant letters that reflect her influential position in Mughal court
politics. See H.A. Rose. 1911. “Persian Letters from Jahan Ara, Daughter of Shāh Jahan, King
of Delhi, to Raja Budh Prakash of Sirmur.” Journal & Proceedings of the Asiatic Society of
Bengal, 8: pp. 449–58.
479 Irfan Habib. “A fragmentary exploration of an Indian text on religion and sects: Notes
on the earlier version of the “Dabistan-i mazahib”.” Proceedings of the Indian History
Congress, vol. 6, 2000–2001, pp. 474–497. http://www.jstor.org/stable/44148125.
480 Muḥsin Fānī. 1294/1877. Dabistān-i Mazāhib. Lucknow: Nawal Kishore, p. 389. (For an
English translation of Dabistān-i Mazāhib, see David Shea, and Anthony Troyer. 1843). The
Dabistan, or School of Manners, translated from the original Persian [of the Muhammad
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 453

A modern-day writer, Ezzati, refers to her as having the “humility of the true
Sufi.”481

10.14 A Sufi Woman Who Led an Agitation and Revoked Her Baiʿat

(1)
Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ
Period: Sixteenth Century
Place: Lahore

Muḥammad Ḥasan Ṣābirī gives an incredible anecdote about a learned ( fāẓila)

woman, Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ in Ḥaqīqat-i Gulzār-i Ṣābirī, a hagiographical account
of the Ṣābirī silsila of the Sufis.482 Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ, daughter of one Saiyyid
Ghulām Aḥmad b. Saiyyid ʿAzīzullah b. Nūr Aḥmad b. Saiyyid Jalāl Bukhari,
on 21 Muḥarram 904/7 September 1498, came with some sweets (shirīnī) for
an offering after her initiation, to a mosque in Lahore, to take baiʿat at the
hands of Ḥaẓrat Shaikh ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad, khalīfa of Shāh ʿAbdul Quddūs Gangohī
(456/1537). When the Shaikh took his seat for the ceremony, Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ
requested that he recite the genealogy of the Ṣābirī silsila from the begin-
ning, starting from the blessed name of the Prophet and his companions.
Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ kept counting all the names. Next, she asked about the locations
of the shrines of the silsila so that she could perform ziyārat (shrine visitation)
after her baiʿat. At the mention of the name of Khwāja ʿAlāu’d-Dīn Ṣābir, she
got up and took back the sweets, saying who could dare reach that desolate
place as for miles around the place of his burial, the sword of Allāh’s wrath
(shamshīr-i qahhāri) guards the place. She then began misguiding (ighwā) the
other disciples, arguing that as it was not possible for one to present himself
in the bārgāh (a court, here the last resting place of the saint) of ʿAlāu’d-Dīn
Ṣābir at Kalyar, how could his silsila be maintained. A large number of people

Muhsin Fani]. Vol. 3, Oriental Translation Fund of Great Britain and Ireland. London:
B. Durpat and Allen and Co.
481 Abū al-Faz̤l Ezzatī. 2002. The Spread of Islam: The Contributing Factors. London: Islamic
College for Advanced Studies, p. 215.
482 See aḥwāl baiʿat na karnai Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ kā khulāfā-yi Ḥaẓrat Quṭb-i ʿĀlam Ṣāḥib sai bā
baʿis dafīnā na honai Ḥaẓrat Bādshāh do-jahān Makhdūm Ṣāḥib kai’ in Shāh Muḥammad
Ḥasan Ṣābirī Chishtī Rampurī. 1304/1856. Ḥaqīqat-i Gulzār-i Ṣābirī. Rampur: Ḥasanī Press,
pp. 407–37.
454 Chapter 10

agreed with this argument and stopped seeking baiʿat at the hands of Ḥaẓrat
Shaikh ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad. About 3,720 disciples who were already under baiʿat
turned away (munḥarif) from ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad and were expelled from the silsila
(rānda-ye dargāh).
The discord and agitation lasted for more than three years. Finally, on 7
Rabiʿu’l awwal 907/1501, after the Friday prayers, Shaikh ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad came
out of his prayer closet. At least seventeen hundred devoted disciples, includ-
ing his spiritual deputies, were also there. Shaikh ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad was in high
state of spiritual intoxication (wajd). When in that state, he asked the assem-
bled if they had come to know Allāh through him. Most, including the highly
devoted followers, responded they had not reached to the level of knowing
Allāh. The author here adds charismatic disappearance of Shaikh ʿAbduṣ
Ṣamad, leaving his cloak and head cover (khirqa wa chādar). In the meantime,
thousands of devotees kept a vigil and moved in circles around the cloak, recit-
ing the Divine attributes. Twenty-one days later, on 19 Rabiʿu’l awwal, with-
out being noticed by the watching crowd, Shaikh ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad reappeared,
donning his cloak. In the meantime, a huge crowd, led by Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ,
entered the premises. Shah Jalālu’d-Dīn Thānesrī, one of the trusted lieuten-
ants, explained the public demand for the construction of a proper shrine over
the tomb of ʿAlāu’d-Dīn Ṣābir at Kalyar. If this was not done, Shah Jalālu’d-Dīn
Thānesrī pleaded, the movement would get stronger and would hurt the cause
of the silsila. He also added that already it was considered by many as a silsila
which had come to a stop (maqṭūʿ). At this point Shaikh ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad asked
to fetch Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ. When she approached, Shaikh ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad stood up
to greet her in respect and said, “Thanks to God. It is because of you the shrine
of Makhdūm ʿAlāu’d-Dīn Ṣābir at Kalyar would be complete on the sixteenth
day, counting from today. It would be Friday, 5 Rabiʿus sānī 507.” Hearing this,
Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ requested for baiʿat. Shaikh ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad, however, told her to
wait till the shrine was completed per her insistence.
Finally, the construction of the shrine became possible in 907/1501, and that
too, according to this hagiography, with the help of eleven thousand jinns and
scholars, led by Shaikh ʿAbdu’l Qādir Gilānī (d. 1166 in Baghdad, Iraq). Thus, a
woman’s agitation resulted in the proper construction of a shrine. One wishes
to know more about Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ, the daring woman who had launched a
public campaign among men and finally success came to her in the form of a
well-built marbled shrine and clearance of a danger-infested land. Thus, her
popular campaign brought together deceased saints, jinns, and living spiri-
tual heads who all worked together for the shrine construction. Surprisingly,
Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ was not condemned either by Shaikh ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad or by the
public in general. Indeed, when she came again for initiation on the fifth of
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women According to Their Status 455

Rabiʿus Sānī, 907, the Shaikh, instead of rebuffing her, asked her to wait until
the shrine was completed.483
This incident, though a rare example of women’s spiritual activism, made
no headway in moulding and reforming arguments against women’s visible
presence in Sufi silsilās which continued to gain momentum in volume and in
the number of its adherents.
483 For the story of Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ also see The Big Five of India in Sufism by W.D. Begg (1999),
pp. 126–27.
 Chapter 11

Biographical Notices of Women Sufis Based on Oral

Traditions Collected by Visiting Their Shrines

This chapter presents accounts of seventeen Sufi women about whom textual
evidence is not found. They are, however, recognised as pious women and ven-
erated by their devotees who visit their shrines to seek blessings and make
offerings. Information given below was collected by visiting these shrines and
conducting interviews with the devotees and members of the shrine-managing
committees. All entries are made according to the location of the shrines in
alphabetical order of the cities visited.
In visiting these shrines, what is particularly striking is their neglected state.
Barring a few, most of these shrines are not known except to the people of the
neighbourhood. The number of such shrines could be larger as there might be
several such shrines in areas that have not yet been explored and documented.
For instance, in several localities in Karachi, within the labyrinth of lanes,
I saw niches and alcoves built into the outer walls of the houses, dedicated to
anonymous saintly females. These tiny shrines are maintained by women of
the neighbourhood who pool money for making offerings (nazar) and lighting
small earthen lamps (diyā battī). These women’s shrines work as instant thera-
peutic centres for women burdened with daily chores and emotional stress.

11.1 Karachi

(1)
Amma Khairuʾn-nisāʾ
Period: Twentieth Century
Shrine: Mewa Shāh Graveyard, Karachi

Situated in the Site Town, near the old Mewa Shāh graveyard in Karachi, the
shrine of Amma Khairuʾn-nisāʾ stands within the shrine complex of her hus-
band, Bābā Kausar. Women devotees feel that, similar to a loving and caring
mother, Amma (mother) Khairuʾn-nisāʾ listens to them patiently and solves
their problems. The shrine is of recent origin as Bābā Kausar passed away in

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_013

Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 457

Figure 19 Amma Khairuʾn-nisāʾ, Mewa Shāh Graveyard, Karachi

1990 in Karachi. Hailing from Junagarh, Gujarat (India), Bābā Kausar belonged
to the Qadirīyya-Chishtīyya Sufi order and has a sizeable following in Karachi.
His ʿurs is held on a large scale on 9 Jamādiʿus- sānī. Amma Khairuʾn-nisāʾ lies
buried along with her husband and his second wife. Amma was the Bābā’s
first wife.
Local women, whom I met at the shrine and in the neighbourhood, have
deep faith in her spiritual attainments and charismatic powers. Women of the
Gujarati community pay routine visits to her grave to seek her blessings. One
such woman I interviewed confided that after finishing her daily chores, she
comes there and sits silently with her right hand placed at the chadar (fabric
covering the grave) of the shrine. She told me that the Amma listens to her
tale, and she feels as if there is someone who cares for her and is prepared to
help her.
The custodian of the shrine (mujāwir), however, felt otherwise. He said that
there were no ʿurs celebrations for the Amma, as it is not permissible to hold
ʿurs for women because women are not Sufis; only men have the honour of
attaining the spiritual status (maqām) and the prestige of being a Sufi.
458 Chapter 11

(2)
Amma Bībī Maryam
Date: 1974
Shrine: Near Keamari Post Office, Karachi

Close to the Keamari Post Office, in a congested market area where traffic is
constantly jammed, stands a makeshift, one-room, asbestos-roofed mazār of
Amma Bībī Maryam. One of my students whose aunt lives close by and is a
regular visitor to the shrine of Pīr Ghāyab Shāh (which stands close to Amma
Bībī Maryam’s shrine) told me about this shrine.
In November 2016 when I visited the shrine, it was locked from inside. We
could not get the door open. I was able to gather some information about her
from people around this area. They told me that Amma Bībī Maryam passed
away in 1974. The shopkeepers and the passersby knew nothing more about
her. On our next visit, fifteen days later, the shrine door was open. The grave
appeared to be of recent construction. We met with a young woman who told
us that she had come “to stay” at the shrine as she had no relatives. A sort of
bedding, rolled up, was lying in one corner and a bag, perhaps holding her per-
sonal stuff, was next to it. We did not stay there for more than ten minutes, as
the environment looked suspicious. While we were leaving, a woman entered

Figure 20 Outside Amma Bībī Maryam shrine, Near Keamari Post Office, Karachi
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 459

Figure 21 Amma Bībī Maryam shrine, Near Keamari Post Office, Karachi
460 Chapter 11

the shrine premises and began offering salutations and prayers. I took a photo-
graph to which she did not object.
Stepping out, a fruit seller who had parked his cart outside the shrine wall
looked angrily at us and said, “Why do you keep coming to this place? Not a
right place for persons like you.”

(3)
Bībī Maryam Bukhārī Shahīd
Shrine: Near Karachi Airport, Karachi
ʿUrs: 1–4 Zil Ḥajj

This shrine is of very recent origin. It is said that some fifty years back a saintly
woman made her abode in the jungle which then existed around the area
where the present Karachi Airport is now built.
Sayyid Jamāl Shah, the gaddi nishīn (hereditary head of the shrine) of the
dargāh, in an interview, gave us some details about the life of Bībī Maryam.
While talking to me, he was distributing tabarruk among the shrine visitors. He
said that when some hooligans attempted to dishonour her, she sought Allāh’s
refuge. Before the ruffians could molest her, she passed out and died on the
spot. Later, when people tried to take her body for her funeral, they could not
move it, so she was buried at the spot where she had died. The present shrine
stands on this spot to commemorate her miraculous death. As her death was
not a natural one, she is now known as shahīd (martyr).
I saw several devotees placing cash offerings on a tray covered with a green-
coloured piece of glittery fabric. A locked cashbox was also there for the visi-
tors to put cash offerings. Devotees write their wishes on a piece of paper and
leave it in a plastic basket, kept close to the grave of Bībī Maryam. Sayyid Jamāl
Shah told me that written requests are speedily answered by the Bībī. Young,
unmarried girls who seek the Bībī’s intercession in arranging an early mar-
riage for them leave coloured bangles tied to a wooden stand near the grave.
Women who wish for a child bring small replicas of baby cribs and leave them
at the shrine. Oil, blessed by the barakat (blessings) of Bībī Maryam’s miracu-
lous powers of healing, is kept outside on a table and devotees smear their
hands and heads and also those of their children to seek cure from ailments
and sufferings. Some tie rags to the tree trunk or leave their written supplica-
tions in a coloured bag tied to the tree. Those whose wishes are granted bring
huge cauldrons of food to offer in oblation. There are several big and small
trees in the compound of the shrine. I also observed that passersby and drivers
of public transport slow down for a while at the entrance gate of the shrine
and offer salām (salutation) with a hand gesture. Some even throw some small
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 461

change towards the shrine’s gate which is collected by a person deputed there
for this purpose.

(4)
The Chilla of Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār
Shrine: Bhimpura, off Nishtar Road, Karachi

The Chilla1 of Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār, a hagiographical holy person who is
believed to have lived and died as a soldier fighting against a local chieftain
in Gujarat, India, is in Karachi. The original dargāh of Mirāṅ Datār, enclosed
within a fort-like structure and believed to be more than three hundred years
old, is situated in the Unawa village, District Mehsana, in Gujarat in India.2 ʿAlī
Muḥammad Khan, the author of Mirāt-i Aḥmadī, the most authentic account
of the political and statistical history of Gujarat and which also includes
notices on Sufis, is curiously silent about Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār. Later translators
of Mirāt-i Aḥmadī, however, noticing this striking omission, have added a
footnote about him. According to this note, Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār’s grandfather,
Saiyyid ʿIlmuʾud-Dīn, a migrant from Uchch, settled in Ahmadabad around
830/1426–1427. His father, Dosan Miyāṅ, married in the family of Shamaʿ-yi
Burhānī and settled in Unawa in 867/1462.3 A passionate devotee of Saiyyid
ʿAlī Datār, however, does not bother about the historicity of the Unawa shrine.
On the contrary, the force of devotion had led them to create replicas in places
far away from Unawa. Thus, if the devotees cannot travel long distances, they
have brought the pīr to their locations. Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār’s baraka thus
has crossed the barriers of time and space.
The fascinating story of the foundation of the Chilla of Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī
Datār in Karachi is part of the untold experiences of migration in 1947, which
upturned the lives of millions of South Asians. The ingenious Gujarati Memon
immigrant community, when they migrated to make Karachi their new home,
following the Partition riots of 1947, brought with it their saints as well. The

1 A chilla is a place for prayers and meditation in seclusion. The word is also used for shrines
that are made as replicas in honour of a saint who is lying buried elsewhere.
2 Some scholars identify Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār as one of the generals of Muzaffar Shah of Gujarat
and as one who fell in a battle. See Beatrix Pfleiderer. ‘Mira Datar Dargah: The Psychiatry
of a Muslim Shrine in India,’ in Ritual and Religion among Muslims in India (Edited) by
Imtiaz Ahmad (pp. 195–233). New Delhi: Manohar (1984). Curiously, ʿAlī Muḥammad Khan,
the compiler of Mirat-i Ahmadi (1750s), a political and statistical history of Gujarat, is silent
about Saiyyid ʿAlī Mirāṅ Datār.
3 Syed Nawab Ali and C.N. Seddon.1928. Mirat-i-Ahmadi. Supplement. Gaekwad’s Oriental
Series. No. XL111. Baroda: Oriental Institute. p. 91, fn. 2.
462 Chapter 11

local residents, however, related a different story to me. The story runs like this:
immediately after the partition of the subcontinent in 1947, life for the large
number of refugees in Karachi was full of misery. Bhimpura, a locality of the
Gujarati Memon and Kuchchi community, off Nishtar Road, had a large vacant
lot at that time. In this area, in one of the hutments, built out of bamboo poles
and gunny sacks, lived a lonely, frail old woman. Hooligans and young job-
less youth roamed around the area day and night, making life miserable for
all. Perhaps to ward off the threatening presence of these street bullies, the
old woman sought Saiyyid ʿAlī Mirāṅ Datār’s shelter. She must have memo-
ries of her visits to the shrine of Saiyyid ʿAlī Mirāṅ Datār in Unawa. With dusk
approaching, she would light a little lamp in honour of Saiyyid Mirāṅ Datār,
hoping this would bring the spirit of ʿAlī Mirāṅ Datār’s for her rescue. The news
spread fast; everyone in the locality needed the saint’s grace to get out of the
quagmire they were caught in at that time. Soon, the hut was overflowing with
others who joined the lonely old woman in her evening ritual of lighting the
little lamp and invoking Mirāṅ Datār’s spirit to bestow his blessings. A modest
amount of money was voluntarily pooled to build a tʿāwīz (sepulchre) as a sort
of cenotaph for Saiyyid Mirāṅ Datār. A boundary wall surrounding the tomb
added much to the sanctity of the otherwise simple-looking structure. Sayyid
Mirāṅ Datār, like his devotees, now had migrated and settled in Karachi.
More than two decades later, in 1970, this simple structure was extended.
Tombs of other family members of the saint’s family were also added. The fam-
ily reunion was now complete as the shrines of Rāstī Mā and Dāmā Mā (the
first was the real mother of the saint and the second was the one who had
nursed him), Dādi Mā (paternal grandmother), and Māmūṅ (maternal uncle),
Ḥamzā, were built.
Beatrix Pfleiderer, a German medical anthropologist, in her ethnographic
study of the shrine of Mirāṅ Datār at Unawa, which she visited several times
and stayed at for several weeks, probably was not aware of the replica of the
shrine in Karachi.4 Other studies, including one by Malika Mohammada and
Nile Green, refer to replicas of the shrine in Bombay and Poone, but say noth-
ing about the one in Karachi.5 For me, the discovery of the chilla of Mirāṅ Datār
was a mere serendipity. I came to know about the magical powers of healing
of Mirāṅ Datār through the life story of a woman whom I met and interviewed

4 Beatrix Pfleiderer. 2006. The Red Thread: Healing Possession at A Muslim Shrine in North
India. Delhi: Aakar Books (Translated from German by Malcolm R. Green, and Virchand
Dharamsey). [First published in 1994].
5 Malika Mohammada. 2007. The Foundations of the Composite Culture in India. Delhi: Aakar
Books; Nile Green. 2011. Bombay Islam. The Religious Economy of the West Indian Ocean, 1840–
1915. Los Angeles: Cambridge University Press.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 463

Figure 22 Chilla of Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār, Karachi

464 Chapter 11

Figure 23 Shrine visitor receiving blessings at the shrine of Rāstī Mā, located within the
Chilla of Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār Karachi

almost twenty years back. This woman, she told me, was freed of the evil spell
that would not let her conceive, by the intercession of Mirāṅ Datār.
A journalist friend who had connections in the Memon community chap-
eroned me to the shrine area. As we got close to the shrine, I saw above the
archway of the entrance gate pictures of Kaʿba and Masjid-i-Nabawi in Madina
were painted. Underneath these depictions, the first verse of the couplet in
praise of the Prophet Muḥammad was inscribed in beautiful calligraphy. The
title and the name of Mirāṅ Datār, on this board, is like a brief bio-note. It says,

Chilla Ḥaẓrat faiẓ rasāṅ Ḥaẓrat Miran Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār Shahīd
Raḥmatu’lah ʿAlsi-hi’
(shrine of the beneficent, Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār, the martyr in
the path of Allah).

The chilla of Mirāṅ Datār is known for curing possessed women. On my sev-
eral visits to the shrine, we were led into the shrine by a pathway to a sepa-
rate women’s entrance. A stone pillar, now fully wrapped by strips of coloured
fabric, stands in the open courtyard. Women tie pieces of cloth and ribbons
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 465

Figure 24 A devotee woman putting oil from the earthen lamp

on her tongue at the Chilla of Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī
Datār Karachi

around it and make supplications. Once their vow is fulfilled they will return,
untie the knot of the fabric, and offer gifts to the shrine. The inner courtyard,
which is fairly large, was dimly lighted and I could hardly see around for a
while. I could see several locked doors on the side walls. I was later told that
women possessed by evil spirits, some in chains, were kept there for months.
Some possessed women, probably semicured, were lying on the ground with
metal chains around their ankles tied to iron pegs. They made faces at me and
made hand gestures which I could not understand. We were not allowed to
enter into this area or get close to the possessed women.
466 Chapter 11

Figure 25 A woman oiling hair of a child as a cure at the Chilla of

Ḥaẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār Karachi

The main hall, which is profusely lighted and decorated with tinsels, had a pil-
lar in the centre and several men were circumambulating it (women also cir-
cumambulated the pillar but at different times than the men). This ritual is the
chakki (grinding stone) ritual. The pillar represents the handle of a chakki. Men
and women perform this ritual separately and at fixed times. On the floor, sev-
eral older women were napping or resting against the wall. Several others were
reciting the Qurʾān. One corner of this hall is partitioned off by a two-foot-high
structure. My informant led me to this area. A female attendant (khādima) was
standing behind this counter-type walled enclosure. Behind her, on the wall,
the names of Rāstī Mā, Dāmā Mā, and Dādi Mā (grandmother) were written in
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 467

Figure 26 Women visitors waiting to enter the Chilla of Ḥaẓrat

Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār Karachi

gold and were glittering. As I approached her, she signalled me to bow my head
and before I could prepare myself for her next action, swiftly she thumped my
head thrice with a stuffed cotton bag and with the same swift action spread her
free hand to get nazrāna (cash offering). I took out some money and placed
it on her palm. She was obviously impressed and with the extra money and
allowed me to take photographs.

11.1.1 Female Shrines within the Dargāh of Haẓrat Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār
There are three shrines dedicated to the three close women relatives of Saiyyid
ʿAlī Datār: Rāstī Mā, Dāmā Mā, and Dādi Mā. Rāstī Mā is said to be the birth
468 Chapter 11

mother of ʿAlī Datār. Dādi Mā is the grandmother of the saint. Their ʿurs is
jointly celebrated on the fifteenth of Rajab. The ʿurs of Dāmā Mā, who nursed
the saint, is celebrated the following day. Women who come to perform ziyārat
of these three women’s shrines, on approaching the shrines, are offered sawa
sau ghoŕoṅ ki salāmi (salutation of a hundred and fifty horses). This is done by
making salutations to the shrine by placing a green-coloured basket (similar
to plastic baskets used for grocery shopping) containing three to four gold-
coloured pagŕīs (fabric wrapped around the heads by males), first on the head
of the visiting woman, then on her right shoulder, followed by placing it on her
left shoulder. This is repeated seven times. While this ritual is performed, the
devotee stands with eyes downcast and hands folded. Once the performance
finishes, the devotee is swiftly exorcised with peacock feathers. Now the visi-
tor kisses the basket and walks backwards and exits the shrine’s marked area.
Asiya, the woman who performed the ritual for me, told me that for the last
two generations, this work has been done by her family. There were several
hagiographical narratives popular in the local Memon community and which
later Asiya told me, about the sufferings of Rāstī Mā on account of her husband
bringing another wife and abandoning her and her son. Women who tradi-
tionally are victims of spousal neglect and other related domestic abuses find
spiritual therapeutic relief in the narration of these anecdotes and are not the
least concerned with the accuracy or historicity of the events.

11.1.2 Healing Rituals at the Shrines

This shrine is known as a place where malevolent spirits, ghosts and demons
(bhūt, chuŕail, pichchal perī), and jenii ( jinn or jinnāt) are captured and the
possessed person is set free of their shackles. The saint’s ʿurs falls on 27 Rajab.
I am told that it is an occasion of great celebrations as on this auspicious day
great relief is brought to the sufferers and the devils are defeated by Saiyyid
ʿAlī Datār. I visited the shrine on one Thursday evening in the month of Rajab.
Thursdays are the days when women possessed by spirits or under the spell of
black magic (kālā jādū), are brought for exorcism.6 These women are known as
ḥāzri wāliʿ auraten (women who are possessed and who act under spell/trance).
In local parlance, the Memon community, both in Karachi and elsewhere, uses

6 Mumtaz Nasir conducted an ethnographic study of exorcism where afflicted women from the
strict parda observing background were brought to the healing room of a man healer created
an appropriate environment for his work by playing audio-tapes of devotional songs that
brought the listener into a trance. See his “Baithak: Exorcism in Peshawar (Pakistan).” Asian
Folklore Studies 46, no. 2 (1987): 159–78. For the role of the exorcist, see K. Ewing. 1984. “Sufi as
saint, curer and exorcist in modern Pakistan.” Contributions to Asian Studies, 18: 108–114.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 469

the term hajari for ḥāzri. Following the evening prayer (maghrib), crowds of
women began to get thicker and soon the whole ground, where women sat
on the floor, had no space left. Some women, eyes closed, slowly started open-
ing their hair braids, their hair flowing from side to side with the jerk of their
heads. Those sitting next to them inched away to give more space for their
performance. A middle-aged woman, sitting almost glued to my side, whis-
pered into my ears, “This is what used to happen to me earlier.” Before I could
take a good look at her, to my bewilderment, she threw her arms into the air,
stood up, and started to shout filthy words, abusing Mirāṅ Datār. She was using
male verbs in her language. All the abuses were about unnatural acts of sex!
While this woman was still continuing, a young girl, slim, fair-skinned, clad in a
black shalwar-kamiz, with long open hair, entered through the shrine door. The
moment she appeared in the doorway of the main hall opening into the court-
yard, the packed crowd of women sitting on the ground quickly divided itself
into two neat sections, making a clear pathway down the centre. The girl now
started running through the open space as if it were a running track. She would
run straight from one point to the other. Slowly she gained speed. With speed
came volleys of obscenities, the kind of which I have never heard before. All
the abuses were for Mirāṅ Datar. In a hoarse male voice, she was now threaten-
ing Mirāṅ Datār of the worst possible sexual abuse. Suddenly she smashed her
glass bangles that she had on both her wrists. The glass shreds cut her wrists
and blood fell onto the ground. She licked some of it. This, I was told, meant
that the dirty spirit is a blood-sucking witch. The pace at which the possessed
girl was running and the speed at which abuses were hurling out of her mouth
was amazing. I felt as if my head was spinning. Some women in the crowd were
reciting darūd (salutations upon the Prophet) and passages of the Qurʾān to
ward off the evil from getting hold of them. The performance lasted for about
fifteen to twenty minutes. The possessed girl suddenly slumped on the ground,
her body quivering and shaking. A few women moved forward and took her
away into the main shrine building. This was the signal for the onlookers to
move. Soon, women began to move towards the exit. I also came out. Outside,
my informant was waiting to walk with me to where my vehicle was parked. He
was a cynical person and told me, “Well, you saw the tamāsha (the show).” He
said that this girl now would be given hot glasses of milk and would sleep over
it. Her turn (for the performance) would come again next month.
I returned to the shrine four days later and took some gifts for the two
khādimās, female attendants, of the shrine. They accepted the gifts with thanks
and agreed not only to talk to me but to share some details about the chained
women in the cells. The stories that I heard are no less than tales of horror that
470 Chapter 11

women suffer. Indeed, at the shrine of Mirāṅ Datār, women’s sufferings, depri-
vation, and social neglect and injustice are witnessed at great height.

(5)
Bībī Umm-i Ḥabība
Shrine: Kharadar, off Nishtar Road, Karachi
ʿUrs: 10 Rabi ʿus-sānī

Except a few oral tales, no information is available about Bībī Umm-i Ḥabība. The
shrine is within the larger mazār of Muḥammad Shāh Sabzwāri Kandilwāley,
located opposite the Khoja Jamāʿat Khāna in Kharadar, one of the oldest resi-
dential areas of Karachi with narrow, winding lanes. On our visit in 2016, the
old inhabitants of the area of the Mir Bahar community of fishermen narrated
this story about the Kandilwāley buzurg (person of great merit). According to
this narrative, more than a hundred years back, an old saintly man lived in a
hut on the beach of Karachi. He kept a lighted lantern at the hut’s door for
the guidance of the fishing boats. Another person also told me that the word
Kandilwāley is a twisted form of the word qandīl (candle or lantern). Nobody
could identify what relationship Umm-i Ḥabība had with this saint. Some say
she was his murīd.
Strangely, women are not allowed to enter the shrine of Umm-i Ḥabība but
have to stand outside the grilled doors to offer fatiḥa (prayers) and do the ziyārat
(viewing) through the steel-mesh doorway. On enquiry, the managing commit-
tee members said this was done under the orders of the Auqaf Department,
Government of Sindh. When I insisted that I would seek confirmation from
the Auqaf Department, after more than an hour-long wait, reluctantly they
allowed me and my two research assistants to enter the premises at two o’clock
in the afternoon. We were not allowed to take our cameras inside the premises.
Interestingly, in 2001, when I first visited this shrine, I was allowed to take pic-
tures of the grave of Umm-i Ḥabība, which lies in a small cell along with the
graves of other males. At my first visit, I was accompanied by a photojournal-
ist of a reputable English-language daily newspaper. This time, our driver was
kind enough to take some photographs from outside the shrine.
The standard of Umm-i Ḥabība is changed at five o’clock pm on the tenth
of Rabiʿ ‘us-sānī. Her ʿurs is not celebrated. The males present at the shrine
told me that the ʿurs celebration of women saints is not permissible. Men who
come to pray at the shrine of Ḥaẓrat Sabzwari also pray at the shrine of Umm-i
Ḥabība and seek her blessings.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 471

Figure 27 Shrine of Bībī Umm-i Ḥabība, Kharadar, off Nishtar

Road, Karachi

(6)
Saiyyida Bībī Āmna and Saiyyida Bībī Banū
Date: 1868 and 1863
Shrine: Site Town, Karachi

The shrine of these two women is close to the old graveyard, Mewa Shah, in
a building which appears to be a residential one. A woman shrine visitor at
the shrine of Pīr Ghāʾib Shāh first told me about this shrine. On reaching the
472 Chapter 11

premises, we were stopped by an elderly man perched on a stool outside the

shrine’s entrance. After several questions about the purpose of our visit, he
finally allowed us to enter. He insisted that, as a rule, only parda-observing
women of Saiyyid ancestry are allowed to enter the shrine. He allowed us to
enter because he said that we looked to be good persons to him. The entrance
doorway was curtained off. Stepping inside, we could hardly see anything as
it was too dark. At my request, he switched on a bulb and opened a window.
We were allowed to take photographs on payment of cash gifts for the mainte-
nance of the shrine.
On one side of the wall, an inscription in Urdu gives the date of death of
Bībī Āmna (12 Rabiʿ-ul awwal 1285/1868) and of Bībī Banū (25 Rabiʿ-ʿus-sānī
1280/1863). On the grave of Bībī Banū, a square wooden structure stood, cov-
ered on all sides by green cloth; the other grave was a low grave covered by a
green sheet. We did not stay long as there was a strong and unfamiliar whiff
that made us feel uncomfortable. I have included this shrine in my work as on
Thursdays a large number of women, at times hundreds of them, visit it and
place offerings at the threshold of the shrine. I have not been able to verify the
dates given on the wall inscription which at first sight looks spurious.
I could see at least four women sitting next to the outer wall of the shrine.
These women refused to speak to us.

(7)
Saiyyida Khadīja Bībī
Date: D. 2 Rajab 1221/14 September 1806
Shrine: Kharadar, off Nishtar Road, Karachi
ʿUrs: 27 Rajab

Bībī Khadīja’s shrine is situated in the congested Old Ḥājī Camp in Kharadar,
Karachi. On my first visit in 2003, I saw that this shrine’s condition, compared
with other women shrines in Karachi, was far better. Males are not allowed to
visit the shrine. I heard a fascinating legend narrated by its woman caretaker,
a Gujarati-speaking woman who declined to tell us her name. The woman said
that more than fifty years back, when she was a mere child of seven or eight
years, the suwārī of the Bībī for the first time came over her, meaning the Bībī’s
spirit entered her body.7 It was under this condition of trance of this woman
that the Bībī disclosed her identity. She said that her name was Sayyida Khadīja
Bībī and that she was the daughter of Shāh Murād, a saint of Thatta. Since that

7 The word suwārī means ‘to ride’ or a transportation vehicle; when used as suwārī ānā, it
means being possessed by a spirit.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 473

Figure 28 Shrine of Saiyyida Khadīja Bībī, Kharadar, off Nishtar Road, Karachi
474 Chapter 11

first revelation, the woman told me, she turned into a permanent vehicle of
the Bībī. Whenever the Bībī’s spirit would enter her body, she could heal peo-
ple, relate things that were not known to other people, and provide answers
to people’s queries, for instance about their employment, marriage prospects,
birth of a son, etc. Narrating the miraculous powers of the saint, she said that
water brought here and kept overnight at the mazār is blessed by the charis-
matic healing powers of Khadīja Bībī. When this miraculous water is sipped
by a childless woman, she is blessed with the birth of a child within a year; it
also heals chronic patients and takes away all their worldly problems. When
asked whether she experiences the trance now, the woman said, “No, I am too
old and feeble and the force of Khadīja Bībī overpowering me is beyond my
capacity of endurance.”
In January 2016, on my second visit, I had some difficulty in locating the
shrine as new structures had been raised which made the area look some-
what unfamiliar. I was told that the area where the shrine stands is known as
Mazaroṅ wālī galī (the shrines’ lane). Arriving at the address, I found the door
of the shrine locked. A woman of the neighbourhood came and unlocked the
shrine for us. This woman was not aware of the above narrated story of Bībī
Khadīja. She said that the shrine was centuries old (qadīmī) and the saint acts
as the guardian of the community. The community manages the shrine. She
also told me that usually women visit the shrine to seek Bībī Khadīja’s bless-
ings before making any decisions, such as letting someone bring a marriage
proposal for their daughters. The tomb’s headstone gives the date of her death
as 2 Rajab 1221 (14 September 1806). Her ʿurs, however is celebrated on 27 Rajab.
The cenotaph was covered with a green sheet, and fresh wreaths were lying
at the head of the grave. The actual tomb was in an underground chamber,
which was visible through an opening in the floor. The underground grave was
surrounded by white painted iron grill to which coloured threads of mannat
(making a vow) were tied. Next to her tomb, there is a small tomb said to be
that of her grandson, who died in infancy. A woman from the neighbourhood
entered the shrine with her mother-in-law and narrated several legends of Bībī
Khadīja’s miraculous powers of healing women in mental distress.

(8)
Māʾī Gāŕhī
Shrine: Gaŕhī Goth, Altaf Nagar,
Orangi Township–Karachi off the Northern Bypass, Karachi
ʿUrs: 12 Shawwāl

The shrine of Māʾī Gāŕhī is almost at the end of Karachi’s boundary, a short
distance from the Balochistan border. This locality is also called Altaf Nagar.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 475

The whole area looks desolate with stretches of sandy and rocky land. Except
the mujāwir of the dargāh, there was no one around. Close to the shrine are
two old graveyards, one named after Māʾī Gāŕhī. The graves looked old and
neglected.
Similar to most other local female Sufis and their shrines in Karachi and
elsewhere, Māʾī Gāŕhī’s narrative is not found in any Sufi canon. To the local
community, however, who are least concerned with the written word, Sufis like
Māʾī Gāŕhī are a reality. The mujāwir of the shrine, on my visit in 2016, told me
that the word Gāŕhī or Gāŕī in the Sindhi language means the colour red. He
also told me that Gāŕhī was not the real name of the Māʾī but it was conferred
upon her by the great scholar and saint, Shah ʿAbdu’l Laṭīf Bhittai, also known
as Bhit jo Shāh (1689–1752). Māʾī Gāŕhī was married and had children. A grave
of her son lies outside her shrine.8
Compared to several other female Sufi shrines in Karachi, this shrine has
an impressive structure and appears to be well looked after, though there is
neither a managing committee nor did I see any sign of the presence of the
Department of Auqaf. A green cash box was kept in one corner of the shrine
chamber. The key to the cash box was under the control of the mujāwir who
opens its periodically and takes out money for the sundry expenses of the
shrine. He buys his daily meals from this money as well.
The mujāwir of the shrine also told me that the Baloch community living in
the Mahajir Camp, Baldia, supervises the day-to-day management and main-
tenance of the shrine. They also provide for the celebration of the ʿurs on 12
Shawwāl. The mujāwir had been serving the shrine for the last fifty years, he
told me. This seemed incredible as he did not look more than sixty years old.
Devotees, mostly from the low-income neighbourhood community, bring in
offerings of fresh flowers, fabric pieces for grave covering, and small amounts
of money. Average cash offerings range between fifty and a hundred rupees,
out of which the caretaker takes some for his personal needs and leaves the
rest for the ʿurs. As regular transport is not available, most devotees come on
Sundays, holidays, or on the ʿurs day. On the ʿurs day, several devotees bring big
pots of biryani (rice cooked with meat) which is given out in langar (free food).
There were no signs of earthen oil lamps. The grave did not have fresh flow-
ers, a usual sight in all the shrines. The shrine had no electricity. As some shrine
visitors come from distant locations and transport is not easily available, some
devotees stay at the shrine for the whole day. There are a few room-like struc-
tures standing in a row at one side of the shrine, each without a door or a win-
dow. The mujāwir, however, insisted on using the word rooms.

8 For Shah ʿAbdu’l Laṭīf Bhittai, see Fahmida Husain. 2001. Images of ‘woman’ in the poetry Shah
Abdul Latif Bhitai. The University of Karachi Press.
476 Chapter 11

The shrine is built on a hillock. Outside the shrine to one side is a grave said
to be that of Māʾī Gāŕhī’s two male attendants. On can see from here a large
graveyard, which in some ways resembled that of the Makli graveyard. The
graveyard is named after Māʾī Gāŕhī. This place definitely needs more research.

(9)
Māʾī Lānjī
Shrine: Siddique Wahab Road, Karachi
ʿUrs: 11 Rabiʿul murajjab

This shrine is on the main Siddique Wahab Road, opposite the timber market
in Usmanabad. Most of the devotees are people from the neighbourhood who
narrate that the shrine has been there for more than a century. My research did
not yield any textual references about Māʾī Lānjī; travelogues and gazetteers
also do not provide any information. An inscription in Arabic, which is of a
recent origin, describes Māʾī Lānjī as a Qadiriyyā and Qalandariyyā Sufi. A man
named Javid, who claims that he is the ancestral custodian (mutawallī) of the
darbār, told me in his interview in 2016 that his family had been taking care
of the shrine since the British rule (angrezoṅ ke rāj). Also, the whole history
of Māʾī Lānjī, he claimed, could be found in a book titled Karachi ke awliyāʾ.
This book was not found anywhere. Local traditions ascribe Mā’ī Lānjī as a
descendant of Ghaus-i pāk (ShaikhʿAbdul Qādir Gilāni). In 2016 when I visited
this shrine, an elderly man who claimed that his family has been the recipient
of Māʾī Lānjī’s blessings for generations, told me that Māʾī Mirāṅ (included in
this work) and Māʾī Lānjī were real sisters and that they both arrived by a boat
from across the sea to Karachi.
In March 2016 we met with a woman shrine visitor who came there with her
children. She did not answer any of our queries and stared back at us. As Javid
was not prepared to talk more, we attempted making small conversations with
people of the neighbourhood. Some of them told us that the salt kept in small
jars at the shrine has the charisma of healing powers of Bībī and the blessed
oil of the shrine is a cure for infertility and skin diseases. A man who owned
a nearby shop said that devotees take bottles of this oil to other parts of the
country as well.
The shrine’s maintenance is the community’s joint responsibility while Māʾī
Lānjī is responsible for the well-being of the community. The actual tomb,
Javid told us, was in an underground chamber, but there was no staircase to
take visitors down to the grave. When we looked down through a square open-
ing, we could hardly see anything as it was too dark, and the strong whiff of
incense and smoke made our eyes go watery.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 477

When I asked the custodian about the income of the shrine (nazrāna), he
got a little frightened and rudely asked us to leave the shrine, sternly telling
me that a shrine is not a place for making worldly conversations. A week later,
when we went again, he did not let us in, and said the shrine was locked for
the day for some repair work. A poster decorated with golden and green tinsels
was now pasted at the outside wall announcing Māʾī Lānjī’s ʿurs on 27 Rajab.

(10)
Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh/Sayyida Junaid Bībī/Mirāṅ Pīr
Shrine: Lea Market, Karachi
ʿUrs: 11 Rabiʿul Ᾱkhir

As I walked towards the pathway leading to the entry of Māʾī Mirāṅ’ shrine in
the congested narrow lane of Lea Market in the old Karachi area, I was amazed
that the metal board adjusted between the two walls announced her name
as Ḥazrat Saiyyidina Mirāṅ Pīr. Saiyyidina, an Arabic term which means “my
master,” is a devotional way of addressing the Prophet. Some have agreed to its
use for the members of the Prophet’s family also and for the first four Caliphs.
I have not seen this term being used for the Sufis. Also, pious women are hardly
known to be addressed as pīr, a term used only for male Sufis.
According to local legends, Māʾī Mirāṅ belonged to the Jilānī Saiyyid fam-
ily and was an accomplished (kāmila) and virtuous person. She never mar-
ried. It is said that she arrived in Karachi on her way to Ḥajj pilgrimage from
her ancestral home in Larkana. In Karachi, she fell ill and rested for a while
near a place where there already stood a dome/vaulted structure (guṅbad).9
Further details of the story about her intended Ḥajj pilgrimage are not known.
According to another oral anecdote, Māʾī Mirāṅ, when death approached her,
instructed those who were present with her to keep her bier outside the dome
and lock the entrance to the dome from outside. She told them that if this
locked door opened on its own, she then should be buried inside the dome.
This is what exactly happened. As per her dying instructions, she was buried
inside the dome. According to another legend, Māʾī Mirāṅ and her sister Mā’ī
Lānjī arrived together by a boat from across the seas. Muḥammad Iqbāl Ḥusain
Naʿīmī collected the above details in an interview with Maulānā ʿAbdu’llah

9 Guṅbad is also used as a synonym for a shrine or grave of a holy person.

478 Chapter 11

Ṣiddique Khatri, a former Imām of the mosque near the shrine of Māʾī Mirāṅ.10
Her ʿurs is celebrated on 10 Rabiu’l Ᾱkhir.11
Although I have visited the shrine of Māʾī Mirāṅ (or Mirāṅ Pīr) several times,
here I would refer to my five visits that are related to this research. My first visit
was in 1997, followed by my second visit in April 2002, and again in May 2006.
I revisited the shrine in 2011 with some of my friends. My last visit was in 2016.
During my visits over these years, I spent several hours, often whole afternoons,
on the shrine’s premises. During these visits, I met with hundreds of women
and have detailed notes and photographs of these interviews. Comparing my
field notes, I am amazed at the similarity of women’s responses who shared
their thoughts with me. The environs of the shrine also showed little change
over the years. On all my visits, I did not hear the legend narrated by Naʿīmī.
On my first visit, the area around the shrine was overcrowded by all sorts of
vehicles, from automobiles to donkey-driven carts. Wayside shops lined both
sides of the lane, selling flower garlands, rose petals, incense, candles, and
small earthenware lamps, filled with mustard oil or ghee, with a cotton wick
in them. The shopkeepers also educated their clients by extolling the merits
of visiting the shrine and making offerings. The shops also sold green sheets
(chādar sharīf), mostly of synthetic fibre, with gold tinsels and gold-coloured
calligraphy and glittery tassels ( jandhiyāṅ), as well as rose-scented candies
(rewŕiyāṅ). Women devotees on their way to the shrine buy these flowers,
sweetmeats, and bottles of oil for making offerings (nazr), and later distribute
them among those present there.
To reach the actual shrine of Māʾī Mirāṅ, one has to pass through three gate-
ways. The main entrance to the mazār has quite an ordinary appearance. Litter
and dirt are scattered everywhere. On my first visit, I was told, on enquiry, that
the shrine belongs (milkiyat) to the Makhdūms of Rānipur, Sindh.12 In 2016,
members of the managing committee avoided answering this query. Passing
through the gateway, one sees several low-level graves all covered with green
sheets.

10 Muḥammad Iqbāl Ḥusain Na‘īmī. 1987. Tazkira awliyāʾ-yi Sindh. Karachi: Shāriq Publica-
tions, p. 54.
11 Fihrist ʿUrs Buzurgān-i dīn Karachi, Taṣīḥ az Ḥaẓrat Maulānā Jamīl Aḥmad Naʿimī Ṣāḥib,
Khaṭīb Masjid Ṣarrafa Bazar, Mīthadar, Karachi, dated, 1st Rabiʿul-awwal, 1398/1978.
12 The pīrs of Rānipur form a powerful group in Sindh politics today. They trace their lineage
to Shaikh ʿAbdul Qādir Jilānī. On my two visits to the house of the custodian of the mazār,
I was told that he was out of the country. The house is situated within the mazār complex.
On my visit to this house, I was greeted by women who welcomed me with a smile but did
not converse and did not answer any of my questions.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 479

Figure 29 A woman healer at the shrine of Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh/Sayyida Junaid Bībī/Mirāṅ Pīr
Lea Market, Karachi

Figure 30 Khalīfas (representatives), appointed by the Sindh Government to look after the
shrine of Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh, Karachi
480 Chapter 11

Figure 31 Women visitors resting at the shrine of Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh, Karachi

Totally different from the well-maintained, well-built, and imposing shrines of

male holy persons, Māʾī Mirāṅ’s shrine is a simple, modest, single green-domed
one-celled structure. The shrine is hardly impressive, compared to the awe-
some architecture and embellishments noticed in shrines commemorating the
male saints. The tomb of Māʾī Mirāṅ stands in the centre of this one-roomed
structure. The front of the low-domed mazār is covered by a corrugated-
tin–roofed shed. Women devotees gather outside the one-door entrance to
the shrine of Māʾī Mirāṅ. On the sill of the arch over the doorway is written
Haẓrat Sayyidana Mirāṅ Pīr. Devotees, before stepping into the one-room cell,
touch the lintel of the door frame (choukhat) with their right hand and then
touch their chest and kiss their hand, imitating the usual greeting pattern in
Pakistan. The lintel, here, replaces the unseen saint. For the devotee, she is not
dead; ordinary vision is incapable of beholding a person who has passed away.

11.1.3 Legends about Mirāṅ Pīr

Myths and legends surround the story of Mirāṅ Pīr, though I have not found
any written reference to her. To check any record or find documents about
the history of the shrine, I visited the Auqaf Department of the Government
of Sindh. The bureaucrats and their assistants kept me waiting in the lounge
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 481

and did not provide any information. The department earns a good amount of
money from this shrine. Their explanation that no information was stored by
them sounded like a weak excuse.13 Interestingly, my first visit caused a bit of
commotion in this office. I was accompanied by two males, my driver and an
office-help. Both these men sat outside the office of the person who I was told
was in charge of the information I wanted to get. Somehow, they mistook me
for someone involved in a property litigation case, in connection with the own-
ership (milkiyat) rights of the land over which the mazār complex is situated.
I am sure that I could not convince the officials that I was not the person they
believed I was, and that I was an ordinary woman doing academic research!
The man in charge of the files told me that the file cabinet was locked and the
key was with his boss who was on a long leave. However, he promised he would
bring the required files to my residence, along with a rare video film of the ʿurs
celebrations of Māʾī Mirāṅ. That never happened.
Thus, the following account is based on oral sources and my observations.
Those who are skeptical of the authenticity of oral sources and only trust the
written texts would certainly remain doubtful. In 1997 and again in 2011, the
woman caretaker (khādima) of the mazār told me that Māʾī Mirāṅ was the vir-
gin granddaughter of Shaikh ʿAbdul Qādir Gilānī.14 It is important to note that
the nisbat (lineage) connecting Māʾī Mirāṅ with Shaikh ʿAbdul Qādir raises her
social and spiritual hierarchy in the Sufi order. It is said that because of high
and respected lineage, she always kept herself veiled from male gaze. Today, no
male can step inside her mazār. The informant further told me that Māʾī Mirāṅ
was a virtuous woman to the extent that no male, other than her brothers and
father, ever saw her face. Far more interesting than this ban on male entry, is
the ban on pregnant women. Pregnant women are not allowed, lest the child in
their womb is a male child! The woman who told of this legend said, in a warn-
ing voice, that if a pregnant woman dares to enter the sepulchre, her unborn

13 In 1960, the Government of Pakistan nationalized all shrines and created the Department
of Religious Affairs and Auqaf which operates at the provincial level. Sindh Auqaf
Department was established in 1970. In 1976, this Department was made a central subject
under the Ministry of Religious Affairs, the Government of Pakistan. In 1979, this was
again made a provincial subject. This has remained unchanged until now.
14 Shaikh ʿAbdul Qādir Gilānī (1088–1166) is the most revered name in Sufi traditions.
Popularly known as Ghaus-i ʿĀzam (the greatest help) and the pīr-i dastgīr (the pīr who
holds one’s hand for support), has a large number of followers in Sindh. Sir Richard
Burton writing in the mid-nineteenth century, says that in Sindh, the name of Shaikh
ʿAbdul Qādir Jilānī is greater than in any other Muslim country. He also writes that there
were about a hundred large trees in Sind, all called after Gilānī. Sindh and the Races that
Inhabit the Valley of the Indus. London: Allen & Co., p. 405 and 177 respectively.
482 Chapter 11

male child will be born blind. Women with male children under the age of
seven are free to enter the mazār complex.
Another narrative of Māʾī Mirāṅ is a typical narrative of an ocean-voyaging
Sufi, arriving on the coasts of Hindustan, riding over the mighty waves of the
Indian Ocean. It is said that she, along with her male relatives and seven virgin
female playmates (sat saheliyāṅ), all travelling in a boat, landed on the coasts
of Sindh. The narrative does not name the place of her embarkation. Similar to
other legends concerning the arrival of Sufis in the subcontinent, travel plays
a central role in this narrative, too.15 The legend has gained popularity in the
Makrāni community of the Lea Market and Lyari, in Karachi, and among the
local fishermen, the majority of whom venerate Māʾī Mirāṅ. The Makranis
trace their origin to African lands.16
The absence of written accounts of Māʾī Mirāṅ are of no concern to her
devotees. On all of my visits, I asked women about the history of Māʾī Mirāṅ.
The majority of women, who appeared to be from the urban poor localities
and seemed to have little or no formal schooling or education, looked aghast.
One of these women, in a convincing tone, said, “She was a godly person (Allāh
lok). This is what we know about her.” Some who were from the affluent classes
and were well dressed, told me, “Men write books. We, women, bear children.
Why would they [write] about women.”

11.1.4 Māʾī Mirāṅ: Infertility Healer

Māʾī Mirāṅ is believed to have miraculous powers (karamāt) of bestowing
fertility on women who have no children.17 Women’s fertility-seeking rituals
at the shrine, especially for getting a male child, speak volumes about wives’
harassment at the hands of their husbands and their in-laws. In case they fail to
produce a child within a year of marriage or if they give birth to a girl, the fear
of desertion, a broken marriage, or domestic violence is so great that a woman
is a willing to negotiate a vow (mannat), irrespective of the cost involved, in

15 See D.F. Eickelman and J. Piscatori (Eds.) Muslim Travelers: Pilgrimage, Migration and the
Imagination of the House of Islam. Richmond: Curzon Press, 1996.
16 For an early history of the Makrani community see John B. Eddlefsen, et al. 1960.
“Makranis, the Negroes of West Pakistan.” Phylo, 21 (2): 124–30; also, Abdul Aziz Y. Lodhi.
1992. “African Settlements in India.” Nordic Journal of African Studies, 1 (1): 83–86; for more,
see R. Hughes-Buller, R. 1907. District Gazetteer of Makran, Bombay Times Press, 1907.
p. 69.
17 It is interesting to note that Bāvā Gor’s sister, Mai Misra whose shrine is with her brother
in Ratnapur, Gujarat, India, is known for her fertility healing miracles. Infertile women
are fed Mai Misra’s khichri, supposed to have the miraculous power of healing female
infertility. See for details Helene Basu. 1995. Habshi-Sklaven, Sidi Fakir Muslimische
Heiligenverehrung im westlichen Indien.Berlin; DArabische buch.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 483

return for the blessing of a male child. Thus, desperate women come here to
be blessed with the birth of a male child. Women with fading hopes of bear-
ing children told me that they present themselves in the august assembly of
Māʾī Mirāṅ (Māʾī Mirāṅ ke samne hāẓrī detī hūṅ) with their appeal ( faryād)
and to seek her blessings for a child. Indeed, a large number of women, from
newly married brides to women in their late twenties, make this ḥāẓirī (pres-
ence before the saint) to get a child with the help (wasīla) of Māʾī Mirāṅ. The
young newlyweds were mostly accompanied by their mothers. Women who
come to seek Māʾī Mirāṅ’s blessings for a child usually bring with them a small
wooden cradle toy for babies ( jhūlnā). They tie these jhūlnās to the four post-
ers standing at the corners of the tomb. I saw a huge number of these toy cribs
there. Once their prayers are heard and their vow to get a child is fulfilled, the
proud, jubilant mothers return with their babies in their arms, to pay a thanks-
giving visit to Māʾī Mirāṅ. These salām visits are often occasion for community
celebrations, marked by free distribution of food (langar) brought by the cel-
ebrating family. They bring flowers, sweets, green coverlets for the mazār, and
sometimes huge amounts of food. A young woman told me she was willing to
spend more than what she can normally afford to bring langar (food for the
poor) for seven Thursdays, a day usually marked for devotional visits, when her
vow of having a son would be fulfilled. Her two daughters were her calamity,
she told me. Her mother-in-law had warned her that the next daughter would
be the end of her marriage.
In Sufi hagiographical literature of South Asia, Shaikh ʿAbdul Qādir Gilāni,
the supposed ancestor of Māʾī Mirāṅ, is venerated for his Divine gift of bestow-
ing sons to barren women. Ghulām Sarwar Lahorī, in his devotional account
of the life and charismas of the Shaikh, Guldasta-yi karamāt (Bouquet of mir-
acles), narrates a story of a barren woman (ʿaurat ʿaqīma). The saint, devotion-
ally addressed as Maḥbūb-i subḥānī (the beloved of the Divine), interceded on
her behalf in seeking Allāh’s blessings, not just for one child or one son, but
for seven sons.18 The woman, however, after being blessed with seven sons, fell
under a satanic spell (wiswās-i shaitānī) and started doubting the power of the
saint. At once, all her seven sons died. Finally, the woman repented, the saint
forgave her, and her sons’ lives were restored.19

18 Seven is considered an auspicious number in Islamic devotional literature. See,

Annemarie Schimmel and Franz Carl Endres. 1994. The Mystery of Numbers. New York:
Oxford University Press.
19 Ghulām Srawar Lahorī. 1900. Guldasta-yi karāmāt. Kanpur: ʿAbdul Qaiyyūm, pp. 133–34.
484 Chapter 11

For most girls in Pakistan, marriage is the only option for an honourable
existence. Mothers, therefore, come to seek Māʾī Mirāṅ’s blessings for an early
marriage for their daughters. A woman from the Lyari area, being the elder
unmarried daughter of a family with several sons working in Sharjah and
Qatar, self-educated, and a Qurʾān teacher, was there to seek Māʾī Mirāṅ’s help
for her own marriage. She told me, “Why not? Why shouldn’t I pray for my own
marriage? It is the blessed tradition (sunna) of my beloved Prophet. Māʾī Mirāṅ
is our mother; sure, she would listen to me. That’s why I’m here. As a mother
she knows what is best for me.”
In the courtyard of the mazār, during my earlier visits, there was standing
the trunk of a dead tree.20 In fact, it was tied to a big rock so that it could
remain standing. The treetrunk was believed to have the power to cure people
ailing from a variety of diseases. I interviewed a burqa-clad young woman who,
with her seven-year-old daughter, was going around the tree seven times in
circumambulation. When she stopped and sat down next to the “tree,” I asked
her what she was doing. She told me, “‘chakkar nikāl rahi hūṅ [I am encircling
the tree] apni beti ke liye-Sūkha ho gaya hai’ [for my daughter]. She is dry-
ing [has stopped growing].” The woman also told me that her daughter was
passing blood in her urine and was extremely emaciated. In response to my
query whether she had consulted any physician for her daughter’s ailment, she
said no, adding that others had told her that this tree had the healing power.
According to a legend, related by a spiritual healer who used to sit under the
tin-roofed shed of the shrine, the trunk was a remnant of a tree of the time of
Māʾī Mirāṅ and carried the charismatic touch of her hands.
During my first visit to the shrine, in 1997, I met with a fascinating spiritual
healer. Outside the doorway of the grave chamber, under the tin-roofed shed,
sat a cross-legged, grey-haired, pale-faced woman, with several jars of varying
sizes and little cloth bundles heaped around her. Next to her, on one side were
kept peacock feathers, tightly tied in the shape of a broom. The woman looked
uneasily towards me, transmitting an unspoken message that I should not get
close to her. I watched her from a distance and made a video and took photo-
graphs of what she was doing. She did not object to it. Soon it became clear
that she was a healer, and a group of clients was on their way towards her. A
woman, accompanied by several children and a man, came and sat in front of
her. All the actions that followed were performed in complete silence, with not
a single word spoken. It seemed as if both parties knew what was to be done.

20 The trunk was removed in 2014 during the renovation of the shrine, which consisted of
painting the walls in green colour. I was told that some local reformist males of the area
were not happy with the presence of this trunk, as it was adding to ‘religious malpractices.’
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 485

The healer woman took out from one jar a reel of thread, measured it with her
hand, from the little finger to the thumb, at the same time looking at the size
of the neck of the child for whom she was going to prepare a charm. She then
motioned to the child with a nod of her head to move forward and crane his
neck. The child was pushed forward by his father. Swiftly she tied the thread at
the back of the neck and cut the extra part with scissors. The child moved back
to his original position. Next, she started briskly brushing the face, hands, and
head of the client with the broom made of peacock feathers. Finally came the
turn of the smallest client—a toddler, skeleton-like, with sunken eyes. He was
aware of his turn. As soon as the others were done with, he began to sob and
looked pathetically towards his mother. The healer woman silently gestured
with her hand to make the child stand. The mother propelled him up. He began
to cry aloud, this being the only sound made during the ritual performance.
The healer woman was least moved by this noise, and silently continued with
her performance, without delaying for a second. As the toddler was the worst
of all the patients, the treatment lasted longer and the broom brushed him sev-
eral times. At each stroke, the child shrieked and pushed the healer woman’s
hand away. The whole performance lasted for no more than fifteen minutes.
The khādima of the mazār later told me that this healing woman actually was
her mother-in-law and that she had been performing healing rituals for the last
thirty-some years. The woman was blessed by Māʾī Mirāṅ, especially for curing
patients suffering from chronic cases of pīlyā (jaundice). The toddler was defi-
nitely a case of jaundice.
On my next visit, in 2006, I found the place of the healing woman was occu-
pied by her daughter-in-law. The passing away of the mother-in-law changed
the role of the daughter-in-law. Thus, similar to the succession in Sufi silsila,
hierarchical structures of spiritual powers are inherited in shrine culture as
well. On my first visit, this new healing woman conversed with me freely. Now
that she had succeeded her deceased mother-in-law and was holding a posi-
tion of spiritual charisma, her behaviour too changed. Not only did she not
look towards me, but she also signaled me that I should not expect any conver-
sations with her. That interactions change so dramatically with transformation
of status was not known to me earlier.
At the back of the mazār complex, in a shed covered by corrugated-tin
sheets, I saw a woman sitting close to a small earthen structure. She told me
this was the āsitānā of Shāh Parioṅ of Makli, Thatta.21 In the shrine’s courtyard
there are several tombs. A cluster of seven tombs is identified as the tombs of
sat saheliyāṅ or sat bībīāṅ (seven virgins, chaste friends of Māʾī Mirāṅ). It is said

21 See the narrative of Shāh Parioṅ in this book.

486 Chapter 11

that the graves of these seven chaste women are replicas of those that are in
the Makli graveyard. The spot attracts women visitors who often sit in circles to
recite the Qurʾān, chat with each other, and sometime even share a meal which
they bring with them from home. Children who accompany them play around.

11.1.5 ʿUrs Celebrations

Each year the ʿUrs of Māʾī Mirāṅ is held on 11 Rabiʿus-sānī.22 Although prepara-
tions start much earlier, on the eleventh the changing ceremony of the ʿalam
(the standard) takes place under the supervision of the Auqaf Department and
is watched by a large number of women devotees who actually come there
several days ahead from outside Karachi. The ʿUrs begins after sunset on the
eleventh (which actually is reckoned as the twelfth according to the lunar cal-
endar). I attended the ʿurs in 1997 and again in 2016.
On ʿurs celebrations, which occurred late in the evening on both occasions,
the crowd got emotionally frenzied with the beating of drums. The din and
noise were so great that I found it almost impossible to talk with the devo-
tees. The door to the hujra (cell) was jammed by women. I could not stand
there for more than a minute. Indeed, I found myself suddenly pushed inside
by the milling crowd. Inside, the air was thick and heavy with incense burning,
with the mixed scent of flowers, some almost decomposed due to the intense
heat, and the body heat of women. Each one was vying with the other to touch
the fabric of the coverlet, to kiss it and put flower wreaths on the tombs. The
ground was covered with rose petals and had become slippery.
In 2016, on occasion of the ʿurs, I watched as a young girl got up suddenly
from among the crowds of women. She began jerking her body and pulling at
her hair. In a thundering voice, she was shouting “Māʾī! Māʾī!” Women made
way for her with folded hands. She was in a trance now. I tried to record a short
video but other women rushed towards me to snatch my mobile phone. They
warned me that I should delete all the recording, otherwise I would be cursed
by the Mā’ī. This time, in 2016, I was also not allowed to photograph the actual
grave inside the cell of the dargāh.

11.1.6 Shrine: Space for Women’s Bonding

The shrine space provides women sisterly certitude and bonding. I found
women, total strangers to each other, crossing borders of ethnic and linguistic
frontiers, mingling as friends, sharing stories of their lives. Some even promised

22 Fehrist ʿurs buzurgīn-i dīn Karachi. Prepared by Ḥaẓrat Maulāna Jamilu’d-Dīn Aḥmad
Naʿīmī. This is a small four-paged pamphlet with no publication details. I got this, free of
cost, from the office of Dawat-i Islami, an organisation known for its growing following
and a reformist programme with its headquarters in Karachi.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 487

to meet again on certain days. While sharing their common stories of ailments,
domestic disputes, financial burdens, and family worries, they often find solu-
tions, or at least a feeling of not being alone. I witnessed one such magical
meeting taking place in the compound of the Māʾī Mirāṅ. A group of women
was reading the Qurʾān on the ʿurs day. I sat next to them. After finishing their
readings, two women sitting next to me started a conversation. One was there
to seek Māʾī Mirāṅ’s intercession for the marriage of her daughter. The other
got interested in her story and told her she might have the right boy for her
daughter. They both agreed that it was all because of the charisma of the Māʾī
who, like a doting mother, never forgets her restless (be-chain) daughters. They
exchanged their addresses and asked me if I could write for them, in legible
handwriting, their addresses and phone numbers for each other. I gladly did
that. What a perfect example of quick networking of all women present there,
including Māʾī Mirāṅ!
An interesting tradition that I observed on this occasion was that almost
all women brought with them hina paste in large containers, on platters, or in
plastic bags. This hina was freely smeared on the hands and hair of each other.23
As this hina was brought as an offering for Māʾī Mirāṅ, women took special care
to grind it on stone slabs. A similar use of hina by women, as a mark of their
devotion, is reported by Afshan Bukhari in her study of the women’s prayer
chamber in the Jami Masjid, Agra.24
Those who did not bring hina with them were given it in large quantities
by other women. Tabarruk in the form of small sweets or suji halwa (halwa
prepared with semolina) was also distributed among the devotees, particularly
among the poor women.

11.1.7 Shrine’s Management

In 2016, women employees of the Auqaf Department, wearing uniforms (white
shalwar-shirt with white headscarf) and name tags, were standing close to the
cashboxes. I heard them telling women to put whatever cash they can afford to
offer in the cashboxes, otherwise the Māʾī would not grant them their wishes.
Women between the ages of thirty-five and forty-five, appointed by the Auqaf
managing committee and designated as Khalīfa (representative) of the shrine,
work in two shifts at the shrine. The last shift ends at eight o’clock pm, the time
when the shrine is locked to be reopened next morning around nine am. The

23 Hina (henna) paste is prepared by grinding the tiny leaves of Lawsonia inermis, a scented
shrub, which often grows into the shape of a tall tree also. Now it is available in dry pow-
der shape or in liquid form.
24 Afshan Bukhari. 2008. The “Light” of the Timuria: Jahan Ara Begum’s Patronage, Piety and
Poetry in 17th century Mughal India.” Marg, 60(1): 53–61.
488 Chapter 11

office of the Mirāṅ Dargāh Committee at the premises of the shrine was all
cluttered with broken chairs, plastic bottles, and soiled clothes. The entrance
was completely blocked by the litter. I met Muḥammad Khan and Muḥammad
Lahuti, chairman and vice chairman of the Māʾī Mirāṅ Dargāh Committee, at
the gate of the shrine. They told me they had set up a meeting with the Auqaf
Department to discuss the expenses of the dargāh.
This shrine of Mā’ī Mirāṅ mirrors the complexities of ordinary women’s lives
in Pakistan. The shrine is indeed a kaleidoscope through which one can watch
the myriad patterns of women’s everyday lives in Pakistan. As one enters the
shrine complex, to the left of the pathway is a low, tin-roofed, large shed with
one door opening. The shed seemed dark inside and it took a while for my eyes
to get accustomed to the dim environment. During my 1997 visit, as I got close
to the entrance, a few women, middle-aged to past sixty years, moved ahead to
stare at me. I could now see that there were several low-level tombs, all covered
with green sheets, over which were laying withered flower inside this room.
Blackened wall niches with unlit earthen lamps made the atmosphere more
depressing. Several women, wearing dirty clothes and with matted hair, were
squatting, sitting, and lying around. Soon, my eyes caught sight of a woman
sitting against the entrance door, a few inches away from where I was standing.
From her looks she appeared to belong to the makrani community of Karachi.
She told me that for the last fifty years of her life she was doing ḥāẓirī, from
early morning till sunset, sitting at the same spot. In this very short woman—
hardly more than three-and-a-half feet—I discovered a natural storyteller. She
told me that she lived in the neighbourhood and had never married. In early
childhood, she was inflicted with a high fever and her parents, being too poor,
could not do much to seek treatment for her. The illness permanently stunted
her growth. No one would, therefore, marry her. After her parents’ death, the
only way to support herself was to come to the shrine and live on the langar
and charity of God-fearing devotees who come to seek the blessings of Mā’ī
Mirāṅ. Looking at her physique, I wondered how painful it must be for her
to walk to the shrine and back every day in the hope of getting a few mor-
sels of food. I asked her whether she managed to walk all by herself every day.
To answer my question, she slowly stood up and said in a resolute voice, “See
here, I can stand and walk.” In this sixty-plus woman’s life, running parallel to
the history of Pakistan, the narrative of women’s experiences in Pakistan is
enveloped. During my next three visits, I encountered this fascinating woman
again and talked more about her life and her experiences. On one occasion, she
confided to me that the mazar was neglected by the government and, though
men’s entry is banned, they still loiter around to prey upon less-alert females.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 489

11.2 Lahore

(1)
Bībī Jamīla Mastānī
Place: Shafiqabad, Lahore
ʿUrs: 21–22 Jamādi-us Sānī

The shrine of Bībī Jamīla is inside the Dargāh of Chatrīwālī Sarkar (the shrine
of the man with an umbrella). It originally existed in the Timber market, Main
Ravi Road, Lahore, but recently, because of the construction of the Metro Bus
lines, the shrine was relocated to Shafiqabad. On my visit, I was told that on
opening the grave of Bībī Jamīla, in order to shift the shroud to the new loca-
tion, the remains were found covered in a fresh shroud. When the grave was
exhumed, a waft of pleasant fragrance emitted. The shrine now is near the Ravi
Road graveyard and is part of a complex of six shrines, including the shrine of
Chatrīwālī Sarkar. The lime-painted walls of almost all the shrines were deco-
rated with slogans and paintings of faces of some religious men. A man loiter-
ing around and chewing on a sugarcane told me that Bībī Jamīla was a disciple
of the Chatrīwālī Sarkar. This was later confirmed by the nodding gesture of
another man, who, I was told, was the manager (mutawallī) of the shrines. This
man, with a flowing beard and wearing several rings on his fingers, did not
answer any of my questions. The man with the sugarcane told me that, as this
man is “a very big pious person,” he does not talk with women. The surround-
ing area was very unkempt. Close by sprawled an animal farm, and the stench
was burdensome. The taxi driver was getting restless as he was worried that the
little boys who were playing around would soon become troublesome. Even
otherwise, there was no point in staying further. As the taxi began to move, the
man who had volunteered to be our help, stepped in front of the vehicle and
said that it is not the tradition to leave a shrine without nazrāna. The amount,
to his satisfaction, was paid.

(2)
Bībīaṅ Pākdāman
Place: Shoe Market, Bazar Shaikūpura, Taxali Darwāzā, Lahore
ʿUrs: 7 Muḥarram

This shrine should not be confused with the shrine of Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ,
which is also in the city of Lahore. This small shrine is in a narrow lane adja-
cent to the Shoe Market, near the Taxali Gate. On my visit, I found the shrine
locked. Through the iron grill covered with mesh, I could read that the title
490 Chapter 11

Bībīaṅ Pākdāman was suffixed with another virtue, ‘māʿsūm (innocent), per-
haps to note Bībīaṅ Pākdāman’s lineage to the family of Hazrat Imām Ḥusain.
Bhola, a shopkeeper selling Lahore’s famous khussas (hand-crafted leather
footwear with gold and silver thread embroidery), on enquiry told me that this
shrine contained the graves of the wife and daughter of Bābā Qāsim of the
Gīlānī Sufi order. I could find no information about Bābā Qāsim. He also told
me that men were not allowed to enter the shrine in honour of the Saiyyid
lineage of the Bībīs. The shrine is looked after by the shopkeepers of the shoe
market. Another man who strolled in to join our conversation told me that the
shrine was as old as three hundred years. Shrine visitors (women only) bring
flowers and sweetmeats every Thursday and light earthen lamps. Those who
arrive when the shrine is locked leave flower garlands hanging on the iron grills
at the shrine entrance. In a room next to the shrine wall, I saw several women
drug addicts. Since the Taxali Darwāzā was adjacent to the infamous Heera
Mandi of Lahore, our driver warned us that we should leave the area before
sunset, which we did.

(3)
Haẓrat Shah ʿAbdu’l Mannān Ḥuẓūrī al-ma῾ārūʿf Burqa῾-posh
Shrine: Hall Road, Lahore
ʿUrs: 27 Rajab

I came to know about the shrine of Haẓrat Shah ʿAbdu’l Mannān Ḥuẓūrī
Burqāʿ-posh (one wearing the burqāʿ) during my visit to Lahore. This saintly
person with a male name was in reality a woman.
According to a legend related by male and female shrine visitors, this
shrine has existed since 1040/1631. The inscription on the grave’s headstone
also had the same date. The inscription describes the saint as belonging to
the Naqshbandiyya order of the Sufis. The visitors also told me that Ḥaẓrat
Shah ʿAbdu’l Mannān Burqāʿposh was indeed a woman and not a man, though
all addressed the saint as “him” and not “her.” It is said that an unknown
burqāʿ-clad woman traveller was once sitting at the place where the present
shrine stands. She was thirsty, and drinking water was not available in the
vicinity. A water well, which had gone dry, was nearby. As she looked down into
the well, water gushed up suddenly. The present well in the shrine complex is
the one that was touched by the miraculous gaze of the burqāʿ-clad woman
traveller, Haẓrat Shah ʿAbdu’l Mannān Burqāʿ-posh. Today, this well is below
ground level and one has to stand in long queues waiting for a turn to touch
this healing water.
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 491

Figure 32 Shrine of Haẓrat Shah ʿAbdu’l Mannān Ḥuẓūrī alma῾ārūʿf Burqa῾posh, Hall Road,
Lahore

On visiting the shrine in March 2016, I met a woman who had brought her two-
year-old ailing son to be cured by the water of the shrine’s well. Several other
women, including young girls, were there for this purpose. There were three
bathrooms to take showers with this blessed water, which is brought there in
small buckets, water jars, and even large-sized plastic bottles. Not only no sepa-
rate bathrooms for women were there, but also the existing bathrooms had no
doors; instead, there were only soiled curtains hanging at the entrance. Family
members, mostly women, had to stand nearby to guard the privacy of women
inside the bathrooms. I was not allowed to take photos of this area, though
I photographed the tomb chamber.
The grave chamber was in a most unkempt condition. Large bundles, filled
to their capacity and looking heavy, were piled on top of each other in one cor-
ner. Shabbily folded coverlets were lying around. A white piece of fabric, per-
haps a cloth that men wrap around their heads in rural areas, was hanging by
the headstone of the grave. The grave chamber was filled with a strong odour
of leftover food. The flower petals, sprinkled over the top of the grave, were dry.
The shrine visitors, however, appeared not to be bothered by this condition.
I wonder whether the healing charisma of the water to cure ailments was the
reason for this.
492 Chapter 11

(4)
Sakhī Bī Jī Sarkār Qalandarī
Place: Sahfiqabad, Lahore

Before my visit to Lahore, I was not aware of Sakhī Bī Jī Sarkār Qalandarī. The
shrine is within the Shafiqabad Graveyard. Arriving at the site, I was disap-
pointed to see the premises locked. I could not find anyone to give any details
about her. Bī Jī, in the local language of the area, means “mother.”

11.3 Multan

(1)
Amma Bī
Period: Not Known
Place: Hasan Parwana Colony, Multan

Inside the dargāh of Pīr Saiyyid Walī Muḥammad, popularly addressed

as Chādarwāli Sarkār, is the shrine of Amma Bī, whose original name was
Maḥmūdā Bībī. She is the wife of Chadar wāli Sarkār, a Naqshbandi Sufi. Next

Figure 33 Chādarwāli Sarkār shrine, Hasan Parwana Colony, Multan. The shrine of Amma
Bī, his wife, is inside this shrine complex
Biographical Notices of Sufi Women Based on Oral Traditions 493

to her grave lies buried their daughter, Zubaida Bībī. Women devotees from as
far away as Lahore and Gujranwala come here to solicit Amma Bī’s intercession
for Allāh’s Mercy. The descendants of Chādarwāli Sarkār manage the dargāh.
The Punjab Auqaf Department has no presence at the shrine. A member of
the managing committee told me that the shrine earns a fairly large amount of
money from the cash offerings of the devotees.
On my visit in December 2016, I found several women who were licking
the salt kept in earthen pots for the devotees. The salt is believed to have the
charismatic powers of Amma Bī and magically cures several ailments. Women
put locks on wires, tied at a height which is difficult to reach. No one could
tell me how the locks were tied at a nonreachable height. Women bring their
children, even their newborns, to offer salām (salutations) to Amma Bī. These
babies, I was told by a woman shrine visitor, owe their birth to the blessings of
Amma Bī.

(2)
Māʾī Meharbān
Period: Not Known
Place: Chowk Shahbaz, Multan
ʿUrs: Last Friday of Rabiʿul-awwal

Near Chowk Shahbaz in the Timber Market stands the shrine of Māʾī Meharbān.
On reaching the shrine, I met Mukhtiyār Bībī, who is the khidmat guzār (care-
taker) of the shrine. Nothing is known about Māʾī Meharbān except what I was
told by Mukhtiyār Bībī, a stern-looking woman. The dargāh, she told me, was a
hundred years old, and her family is its ancestral mujāwir. The ʿurs is celebrated
on the last Friday of each Rabiʿul-awwal. Expanses for the ʿurs celebrations are
defrayed from the money deposited in the cashbox by the shrine visitors who
are mainly women. The Bhutta community of the Punjab, to which Mukhtiyār
Bībī belonged, also contributes for the celebrations as well as for the shrine’s
maintenance. The dargāh opens only on Thursdays. Women bring small cash
offerings, cooked food, and fresh flowers. Food is also distributed among the
poor who gather here on Thursdays in large numbers.
On my visit to the shrine in December 2016, I found the shrine door locked.
Mukhtiyār Bībī lives close by. She came to open the main entrance, but she did
not allow us to enter the shrine. She told me that she had first to seek the per-
mission of Māʾī Meharbān to allow us to enter the grave chamber. This she did
by knocking at the grave while we were kept waiting at the doorstep. Finally, we
were allowed to step in. She asked us to put some money in the cashbox, which
we did. Inside the chamber, we saw litter scattered around, a rusty wall clock
which was not running, and paper flower wreaths tied to the grave’s aluminum
494 Chapter 11

railings. Within five to seven minutes, we were asked to leave. As we wanted to

take photographs, the woman agreed after accepting a little amount of money.
Outside the shrine, within its walled enclosure, oil was stored in plastic jars.
Mukhtiyār Bībī sells small plastic bottles of oil and charges ten rupees per bot-
tle from the devotees and puts this money in the cashbox, she told me.
Most women come here to seek boons for fertility. Some come for their bet-
ter economic life, good relations with their husbands, and the health of their
children. As Māʾī Meharbān was a virgin, not only adult males but even male
children are not allowed to enter the shrine premises. The rule for screening
the dead saint from male gaze is so rigid that even pregnant women are not
allowed to enter the grave chamber, lest they might be pregnant with a male
foetus.
On my way back from the shrine, I noticed that several small shops in the
neighbourhood, to seek Māʾī Meharbān’s blessings, bore her name.

(3)
Pākdāman Bībīāṅ
Date: 1970s
Place: Mumtazabad Railway Phatak, Multan
ʿUrs: 13 Shawwāl

Pākdāman Bībīāṅ’s shrine, also known as Rawzā-i mubārak ḥaqq Pākdāman

Bībīāṅ (the holy shrine of chaste women), is built over the graves of two women
whose names on the headstones are given as zauja muḥtarama (the honour-
able spouse) of Bābā Mastān ʿUmru’d-Dīn Chishtī-Ṣabirī (d. 11 September 1973)
and zauja muḥtarama of Bābā Sirāju’l Ḥaqq Shah Chishtī-Ṣabirī. I visited the
shrine in December 2016. The graves of these two virtuous women are within
a curtained small room built within the mosque complex. The room was too
dark for me to see well. I had to make several requests to switch on the lights
inside. The woman guard, after switching on the single bulb, closed the door
from inside. I was allowed to take photographs only after much pleading.
Women devotees visit the graves of the two women and place chādars (fab-
ric covers, mostly made of green-coloured shiny fabric with embossed verses
of the Qur’an in gold lettering) and flowers on their graves, light oil lamps,
and make cash offerings. In our conversation, the Imam of the masjid, Ḥāfiz
Muḥammad Zamān, told us that these two women, similar to other pious
women, are not Sufis because Allāh has accorded wilāyat only to men and not
to women. Because of this, he argued further, the ʿurs celebrations are not per-
missible for women, irrespective of the fact that they might have been pious
and virtuous women.
 Chapter 12

Sufi Women Identified by Name Only

12.1 Balochistan’s Forgotten Women Saints

This brief note is added here with the purpose of revealing lost or hidden
knowledge about pious women with the hope that soon more research will be
undertaken to explore women’s spiritual experiences, roles, and lives.
Sufis and Sufism are part of the religious experience of the people of
Balochistan. Shrines have also existed in abundance in Balochistan for the past
several hundred years. Documents and records in the local languages, similar
to the other regions of South Asia, have yet to be documented and archived
properly. In the absence of or nonavailability of indigenous sources, district
gazetteers, despite their heavy colonialist point of view, often fill this gap.
These gazetteers record the presence of women saints in Balochistan in large
number. Some of this pertinent information was lost even when these gaz-
etteers were prepared. In 1907, McConaghey, who compiled the Sibi District
Gazetteer, pointed out the much-needed extensive research to document the
remnants of these shrines. To illustrate his comment, he referred to Bray who
mentioned the existence of a shrine of Māʾi Baréchāni or Gondrani in Las Bela,1
“where no one may stay more than two nights or he will be overwhelmed with
a shower of stones from heaven.”2 The area named after Māʾi Gondrani (which
is also known as Shehr-i Roghan) is an archaeological cave-city site near Bela.3
According to local legends, Mai Gondrani (or Māʾi Balochani/Māʾi Pir) fought
and killed demons and freed her city from their spell. After independence,
some commendable efforts were initiated to rescue historical evidence from
total loss. In this context, Inʿam-ul-Haq Kausar produced some studies in Urdu
in which he mentions the names of a few other female saints of Balochistan,
such as Māʾi Khairū of the Bhawlanazi tribe, Māʾi Saidū of the Muḥammadāni
tribe, and Māʾi Natrū of the Ghazli tribe.4 The shrine of Bībī Peroz Khātūn
in Dopasi between Sibi and Quetta has been partially washed away by flash

1 It is a coastal district of Balochistan, which remained a princely state until 1955.

2 Denis Bray, 1913. Census of India, 1911, vol. 4, Baluchistan. Calcutta: Superintendent Govern-
ment Printing, p. 63.
3 Government of Balochistan, Quetta & UNICEF, Provincial Office, Quetta. 2011. District Devel-
opment Profile. Quetta: Lasbela Planning & Development Department.
4 Inʿām-ul-Ḥaqq Kausar. 1986. Taẓkira sufiyā-yi Balochistān. Lahore: Urdu Science Board,
pp. 293–94.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_014

496 Chapter 12

floods. About the presence of women saints in Sibi, McConaghey had earlier
noted, “The Marris also have their female saints who include Māʾi Khairi, a
Bahawalanzai lady; Māʾi Sado, to whom a shrine has been erected in the Nesau
plain; and Māʾi Natro, a Ghazani saint, whose shrine lies close to Buzher.”5
Describing the religious beliefs of the Balochs and the healing powers of
their saints, the Gazetteer observed, “These saints are invoked to cure diseases,
to avert calamities, to bring rain, and to bless the childless with offspring.
Saiads and mullās also play an important part, and their amulets, charms and
blessings are constantly invoked. Some of them are credited with the power
of bringing rain, of curing disease, of granting children, of averting rust and
locusts from the crops and of exorcising evil spirits.”6

12.2 Sufi Women of Ahmedabad, Gujarat, Whose Narratives Are Lost

Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf, author of a biography of Indian saints and mystics,

Bahr-e-Zakhkhār, compiled in 1788–1789, writes that a large number of Sufis of
the highest spiritual merits (dar ḥālāt, wilāyat wa kamālāt be ghāyat mumtāz
and) have existed. Even Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf could not find any narratives
of these Sufis in any texts, but he says that their names are remembered in
the awrād (daily remembrance exercise) of Ḥāfiz Ghulām Rasūl Gujarati.7 The
list of names of these Sufis includes women Sufis as well. Following are the
names of these pious women. Details about these women are not known.8

Sister of Baba Gaur and Baba Habsh

Bībī Fatḥ Shah
Bībī Māṅ
Bībī Ummatu’l Ḥabīb
Bībī Rābiʿa
Jān Bībī
Achūt Kokhī
Bībī Achchī
Bībī Baŕī

5 McConaghey, Allen. 1907. Sibi District Gazetteer. Compiled by Major A. McConaghey and
assisted by Rai Sáhib Diwán Jamiat Rai. Bombay: The Time Press, p. 298.
6 Ibid, p. 73.
7 I could not find information about Hafiz Ghulam Rasul Gujarati.
8 Wajihu’d-Dīn Ashraf. Bahr-e-Zakhkhar. (Ed.) Azarmi Dukht Safavi. 2012. Bahr-e Zakhkhar,
Critical Edition with Introduction and Notes (vol. 3). Aligarh: Institute of Persian Research,
Aligarh Muslim University (Originally composed in 1788–89), pp. 17–20.
Sufi Women Identified by Name Only 497

Rani Yasmatī
Dhrman Harī
Bībī Jī
Māʾī Jī
Bībī Maryam
Bībī Ṣāḥib
Ṣāḥib Jamāl
Bībī Zarīf

12.3 Women Sufis of Bengal and Bihar with Scanty Information

1. Bībī Sua of Bishnupur, Dinajpur, West Bengal.9

2. Majzubū Bībī (thirteenth century), sister of Saiyyid Miran Shāh of
Kanchanpur, Noakhali, West Bengal.10
3. Bībī Anwar, alias Bībī Chaladdhī, waliyyā kāmilā, did not marry (shadi na-
kardand). Dates are not known.11
4. Bībī Tājan, daughter of Makhdūm Shah ʿAbdul Ḥa’i, was an ʿārifa,
ṣāḥib-i-kamālāt wa karāmāt (an excellent gnostic with miraculous
powers).12
5. Bībī Daulat Jahān (Chishtī), wife of Ḥaẓrat Sayyid Muḥammad, was an
ʿārifa kāmilā (perfect saint).13
6. Bībī Ḥifẓuʾn-nisāʾ (18th c.) of Patna, Bihar, was a perfect saint with virtues
similar to Rābiʿa.14

12.4 Women Sufis of Bijapur Whose Names Only Are Known

1. Bībī Qadiriyya (d. 12 Rajab). Shrine was built on a raised platform.15

2. Jachcha Bī, shrine inside Fatḥ (also spelt Fatah) Darwāzā.16

9 Muhammad Ismail. 2010. Hagiology of Sufi saints and the spread of Islam in South Asia,
p. 160.
10 Ibid, p. 167.
11 ῾Abdur Razzāq, ῾Aṭā᾽ Ḥussain. 1302/1884. Kanzu’l Ansāb. Bombay: Maṭbaʿ Ṣafdarī, p. 230.
12 Ibid, p. 232.
13 Ibid, pp. 235.
14 Ibid, p. 283.
15 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-i Bijāpur (1825), p. 231.
16 Ibid.
498 Chapter 12

3. Bībī Sāḥiba, Chāh Bībī, Ṣāḥibnī Ṣāḥibā, ʿĀmīr Ṣāḥibā, and Bībī Shamsa
(daughter of ῾Abul Alādi [d. 16 Rajab]), was buried in domed shrine in
Zuhrapur, Ṣāḥibā Rājā (d. 21 Rabiʿul awwal) had a shrine near Dargāh
Hāshim Dastgīr. Ummatu’l Islām, Ummatu’l Ḥafīz, Ummatu’l Majīd,
Achcho Ṣāḥiba, and Puchchā Bībī were known as saintly women.17

12.5 Women Sufis (Ḥaẓrāt ʿaurāt ʿārifā) Mentioned in a Hagiographical

Work by Shāh Muḥammad Ḥasan Ṣābirī-Chishtī Rampuri. 1311/1893.
Tawāri ̄kh aī ̄na-yi taṣawwuf. Rampur: Ḥasani Press

12.5.1 Women Appointed as Khalīfas

Name of Sufi Date of birth/death/ Date/place of Pages

other details appointment

1. Zahūrun-nisāʾ bint-i Naqshbandi silsila, 13 Muḥarram 1293/1876, p. 518

Sayyid Naʿīmu’d-Dīn lived in Hugly, Bengal Hugly, Bengal
2. Khadīja Begam Ṣābīri-Qādrī, living in 23 Ṣafar 1293/1876. Ibid.
bint-i Zamān Khan Ahmadabad at the time Appointment con-
of the completion of ferred in Rampur, UP
the source

12.5.2 Women Sufis (Ḥaẓrāt ʿaurāt ʿārifā)

Name Date & place of birth Date & place of death Pages

1. Ḥaẓrat Ummatu’l 1 Rajab 318/30 July 930 4 Rajab 390/30 July p. 344
Islām 1000. Shrine near
Makanpur, UP
2. Ḥaẓrat Bībī Jamīl 21 Ramaẓān 592/18 7 Rajab 699/28 March p. 344
Khatūn August 1196 1300. Shrine Dīpālpur,
Punjab
3. Ḥaẓrat Zuhra 16 Shawwāl 602/26 May 11 Safar 602/20 April p. 345
1206 1350. Shrine near
Bahraich, UP

17 Ibid.
Sufi Women Identified by Name Only 499

12.5.3 Dar Zikr-i majāzīb (Plural of majzūb) (An Account of the Intoxicated
Ones), pp. 349–386

Name Date/place of birth Date of death

1. ʿAbd-i khās 13 Muḥarram 205/29 22 Ziqʿad 299/10 July 912.

Qamarī bint-i June 820. Near Hirat, Shrine near Delhi, Kuhna
Shamsu’d-dīn, Afghanistan
caste Mugha1
2. ʿAbd-i khās 21 Ziqʿad 203/20 May 819 14 Shawwāl 300/24 May 913.
Karīmya Dīwānī Shrine in Amroha, UP
3. ʿAbd-i khās 23 Zilḥajj 215/10 February 11 Rajab 301/10 February 914
Fakhrun 831 Shrine Kotana, UP
4. ʿAbd-i khās 27 Safar 221/20 February 12 Safar 311/1 June 923.
Fkhruʾn nisa‌ʾ 836. Farrukhabad (UP) Shrine Delhi Kuhna (East)
bint-i Ismāʿīl
5. ʿAbd-i khās 22 Ṣafar 257/January 871 14 Shʿabān 337/16 February
Waiziya Qaṣūrī 949. Shrine in Farrukhabad,
UP
6. ῾Abd-i khās 16 Safar 292/28 December 12 Ziqʿad 377/4 March 988.
Ḥabīban 904 Shrine in Sambhal, District
Muradabad, UP
7. ʿAbd-i khās 17 Shawwāl 277/1 February 19 Safar 382/26 April 992.
Ḥamwia 891 Shrine in Murādnagar, near
Delhi
8. ʿAbd-i khās Jʿafrī 22 Ramaẓān 301/22 May 913 16 Rajab 396/18 April 1006.
Shrine, Farrukhabad, UP
9. ʿAbd-i khās Walī 19 Safar 301/24 September 22 Shawwāl 397/11 July 1007.
Niʿmata 913 Shrine, Delhi
10. ʿAbd-i khās 13 Ramaẓān 307/6 February 16 Shawwāl 400/2 June 1010.
Farīfah 920 Shrine, Meeruth, UP
11. ʿAbd-i khās 12 Rabilʿul Awwal 357/15 17 Shʿabān 427/15 June 1036.
Niʿmat Aswad February 968 Shrine, Kanpur.
12. ʿAbd-i khās 27 Safar 377/28 June 987 23 Zilḥajj 455/17 December
Munawwar 1063. Shrine in Qannauj
Begam
13. ʿAbd-i khās 12 Ramaẓān 417/27 October 16 Ziqʿad 500/9 July 1107.
Asgharī 1026 Shrine Hyderabad, Sindh
14. ʿAbd-i khās 22 Muḥarram/19 January 24 Shawwāl 501/6 June 1108.
Nihāyat Begam 1031 Shrine in Shahjahanpur
500 Chapter 12

(cont.)

Name Date/place of birth Date of death

15. ʿAbd-i khās 14 Shʿabān 427/12 June 1036 23 Rajab 527/30 May 1133.
Mubārak Shrine in Ahmadabad,
Gujarat
16. ʿAbd-i khās Jʿafrī 27 Shawwāl 487/8 17 Ramaẓān 542/9 February
Sughra November 1094 1148. Shrine near Bagh Rani,
Allahabad
17. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 9 Safar 511/12 June 1117. Born 17 Rabiʿul Awwal 600/24
Iqrār, caste in Sūrat November 1203. Shrine in
Shaikh Farūqi Sūrat
18. ῾Abd-i khās Bī 11 Rajab 515/25 September 16 Shawwāl 600/17 June 1204.
ʿIsmat Panāh 1121 Shrine in Sardhana, UP
19. ʿAbd-i khās 13 Rajab 512/30 October 1118. 22 Shʿabān 613/5 December
Bī Banjāwar Born in Burhanpur 1216. Shrine in Burhanpur,
Khatam Deccan
20. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 16 Rabiʿul awwal 515/4 June 13 Safar 615/11 May 1218. Shrine
Amna (Afghan) 1121. Gujarat in Gujarat
21. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 17 Shawwāl 522/14 October 11 Rajab 622/19 July 1225.
Ḥurmat (Turk) 1128. Gujarat Shrine in Gujarat
22. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 3 Rajab 521/July 1127. Born 7 Muḥarram 641/7 July 1242.
Wīza (Nusrat in Surat Shrine in Surat.
Ḥusainī Saiyyid)
23. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 22 Shawwāl 555/25 October 13 Zilḥajj 656/10 December
Sarāmat Zū 1160. Gujarat 1258. Shrine in Gujarat.
(Turk)
24. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 18 Rajab 555/24 July 1160. 9 Muḥarram 671/6 August
Jagga Jī Jogan Bijapur 1272. Shrine in Bijapur
25. ʿAbd-i khās Bībī 6 Rajab 575/7 December 9 Safar 681/19 May 1282.
Bakhtāwar 1179. Qannauj, UP Shrine in Qannauj, UP
26. ʿAbd-i khās 16 Jamādiu’l Awwal 521/30 17 Jamādiu’l Awwal 691/6 May
Bībī Karmwant May 1127. Kalpi 1292. Shrine in Kalpi
(Saiyyid)
27. ʿAbd-i khās 11 Shʿabān 609/6 January 18 Rajab 700/29 March 1301.
Bī Ṣamad 1213. Sistan, Sindh Shrine in Sistan, Sindh
Wahīd (Jalālī
Sayyidani)
Sufi Women Identified by Name Only 501

(cont.)

Name Date/place of birth Date of death

28. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 2 Shʿabān 947/2 December 12 Ramaẓān 1000/22 June

Makoh (Rajput 1540. Jodhpur 1592. Shrine in Jodhpur
neo-Muslim)
29. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 16 Shawwāl 903/7 June 1498. 12 Ramaẓān 1001/12 June 1593.
Hauri (Maḥbūb Lahore, Punjab Shrine in Lahore, Punjab
Sikh Musalmān)
30. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 13 Zilḥajj 901/23 August 19 Shawwāl 1007/15 May 1599.
Khud Raiḥān 1496. Kashmir Shrine in Kashmir
(Shaikh)
31. ʿAbd-i khās 13 Ramaẓān 905/12 April 11 Zilḥajj 1011/22 May 1603.
Bī Baharangī 1500. Jammu Shrine in Jammu
(Neo-Muslim)
32. ʿAbd-i khās 17 Rajab 900/13 April 1495. 28 Shʿabān 1017/7 December
Bī ʿAzīmuʾn- Born in Ajmer Sharīf 1608. Shrine in Ajmer Sharīf,
nisāʾ (Siddiqui Rajasthan
Shaikh)
33. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 22 Rabi῾u’l awwal 912/12 21 Shawwāl 1017/28 January
Dorī (Jat) August 1506. Jodhpur 1609. Shrine in Jodhpur
34. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 28 Shʿabān 918/8 November 14 Rajab 1021/10 September
Sangī Jog (Neo 1512. Jammu 1612.
Muslim) Shrine in Jammu.
35. ʿAbd-i khās 11 Shʿabān 921/20 22 Jamādiu’l-awwal
Bī ʿAzīman September 1515. Hyderabad, 1027/17 May 1618. Shrine in
(Sayyidani) Sindh Hyderabad, Sindh
36. ʿAbd-i khās 27 Rabiu’l awwal 999/23 22 Rajab 1047/10 December
Bī Maddu January 1591. Multan 1637. Shrine in Multan
(Afghan)
37. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 19 Jamādīu’l Awwal 921/1 14 Muḥarram 1061/7 January
Khūbān (Shaikh July 1515. Jaipur 1651. Shrine in Jaipur
or Sayyid)
38. ʿAbd-i khās 7 Muḥarram 977/22 June 21 Shʿabān 1067/4 June 1657.
Bī Ḥurmat 1569. Hyderabad, Sindh Shrine in Hyderabad, Sindh
(Shaikh)
39. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 13 Jamādīu’l Awwal 999/9 14 Muḥarram 1097/11
Aḥmar March 1591. Hyderabad, December 1685. Shrine in
Deccan Hyderabad, Deccan
502 Chapter 12

(cont.)

Name Date/place of birth Date of death

40. ʿAbd-i khās Sadā 22 Ramaẓān 1082/22 9 Shʿabān 1100/29 May 1689.
Mantī (Jogan January 1672. Murshidabad Shrine in Murshidabad
Musalmān)
41. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 17 Safar 1007/19 September 23 Shʿabān 1103/9 May 1692.
Jaggo, naddafā 1598. Hugli Shrine in Hugli
(carder)
42. ʿAbd-i khās 27 Shawwāl 1013/12 March 7 Zilḥajj 1109/16 June 1698.
Mor Banī 1605. Murshidabad Shrine in Murshidabad
(neo-Muslim)
43. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 11 Zilḥajj 981/3 April 1579. 14 Shʿabān 1117/1 December
Ghaurī Sultan Peshawar 1705. Shrine in Peshawar
44. ʿAbd-i khās 17 Rajab 972/6 August 1583. 11 Shawwāl 1171/18 June 1758.
Bī Bagrī Lahore Shrine in Lahore
Dīwanī (Sikh
Musalmān)
45. ʿAbd-i khās 3 Safar 972/10 September 18 Rajab 1187/5 October 1773.
Bī Gori 1564. Gajj Makrān Shrine in Gajj Makrān
(neo-Musalmān)
46. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 27 Rajab 1110/29 June 1699. 13 Shʿabān 1187/30 October
Ṣāliḥa (Afghan) Āonla, UP 1773. Shrine in Rampur, UP
47. ʿAbd-i khās 27 Ziqʿad 1011/8 May 1603. 3 Muḥarram 1191/11 February
Bī Mukandī Dhaka 1777. Shrine in Dhaka, Bengal
(Brahman
neo-Musalmān)
48. ʿAbd-i khās 22 Jamādiu’l Akhir 1107/28 17 Zilḥajj 1196/11 February 1777.
Bī Naumāh January 1696. Āonla, UP Shrine in Bareilly,
(Afghan)
49. ῾Abd-i khās Bī 14 Shawwāl 1127/13 October 12 Shʿabān 1197/13 July 1783.
Zahra Begam 1715. Gujarat Shrine in Bagi, near Rampur,
(Afghan). UP
50. ʿAbd-i khās 22 Shawwāl 1119/16 January 22 Ramaẓān 1197/21 August
Bī Ḥalīma 1708. Swat 1783. Shrine in Rampur, UP
(Afghan)
51. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 7 Shawwāl 1022/20 13 Zilḥajj 1197/8 November
Nīloh (Rajput November 1613. Jodhpur 1783. Shrine in Jodhpur,
Musalmān) Rajasthan
Sufi Women Identified by Name Only 503

(cont.)

Name Date/place of birth Date of death

52. ʿAbd-i khās 27 Shʿabān 900/23 May 23 Shawwāl 1198/9 September

Bī Jokhī 1495. Jaipur, Rajasthan 1784. Shrine in Jaipur,
(Musalmān Rajasthan
Turk)
53. ʿAbd-i khās 13 Zilḥajj 1112/21 May 1701. 22 Rabi῾u’l ākhir 1199/2
Bī Khusrān Āonla, UP February 1785. Shrine in
(Afghan) Mohalla Rajdwara, Rampur,
UP
54. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 3 Safar 999/1 December 12 Shʿabān 1199/18 July 1785.
Jabīn (Afghan) 1590. B. Peshawar Shrine in Peshawar
55. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 21 Shʿabān 1111/11 February 14 Rabiʿul awwal 1202/24
Mīrās (seam- 1700. B. Bareilly, UP December 1787. Shrine in
stress by Bareilly, UP
profession)
56. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 17 Rabi῾u’l awwal, 1110/23 22 Shʿabān 1202/28 May 1788.
Munawwarī September 1698. Benares. Shrine in Benares
(Dry fruit seller)
57. ʿAbd-i khās 11 Rajab 1103/29 March 1692. 12 Zilḥajj 1202/13 September
Gumānī Bībī Patna, Bihar 1788. Shrine in Patna, Bihar
(Afghan)
58. ʿAbd-i khās ʿAjab 11 Shʿabān 1121/16 October 13 Muḥarram 1203/14 October
Begam (Dry 1709. B. Akbarabad, UP 1788. Shrine near Tajganj,
fruit seller) Akbarabad
59. ʿAbd-i khās 14 Shʿabān 1111/4 February 3 Safar 1203/3 November 1788.
Bī Rūpī (Ahīr 1700. Manka, suburbs of Shrine in Sundarban, Bengal
Musalmān) Sundarban, Bengal
60. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 16 Rabiʿul awwal 1101/27 13 Ramaẓān 1203/7 June 1789.
Umraoʾ Begam January 1690. Lucknow, UP Shrine in Lucknow, UP
(Sayyidani)
61. ʿAbd-i khās 13 Rabiʿul awwal, 1105/12 16 Shawwāl 1203/10 July 1789.
Bī Jammo November 1693. Bareilly, UP Shrine in Bareilly, UP
(Afghan)
62. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 7 Safar 1102/10 November 12 Zilḥajj 1203/3 September
Da‌ʾoghnī 1690. Chittagong, Bengal 1789. Shrine in Chittagong,
Bengal
504 Chapter 12

(cont.)

Name Date/place of birth Date of death

63. ʿAbd-i khās 12 Rajab 1115/21 November 12 Zilḥajj 1203/3 September

Bībī Khātūn 1703. B. Akbarabad, UP 1789. Shrine in Akbarabad, UP
(Hussaini
Sayyid)
64. ʿAbd-i khās 12 Shʿabān 1111/2 February 14 Zilḥajj 1203/5 September
Bī Zahūrat 1700. Faizabad, UP 1789. Shrine in Faizabad, UP
(Sayyidani)
65. ʿAbd-i khās 11 Shʿabān 1103/28 April 14 Muḥarram 1205/23
Niʿmatī Begam 1692. Muradabad, UP September 1790. Shrine in
(Turk) Sambhal, UP
66. ʿAbd-i khās 21 Zilḥajj 1103/3 September 11 Shʿabān, 1205/15 April 1791.
Bī Amānī 1692. Lucknow, UP Shrine in Lucknow, near the
(Mughal) riverbank
67. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 9 Safar 1111/6 August 1699. 7 Muḥarram 1206/6
Namūn (Rajput Murshidabad, Bengal September 1791. Shrine in
Musalmān) Murshidabad, Bengal
68. ʿAbd-i khās 16 Muḥarram 1103/9 22 Safar 1207/9 October 1792.
Bī Shammūn October 1691. Murshidabad, Shrine in Murshidabad,
(Jogan) Bengal Bengal
69. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 14 Zilḥajj 1103/27 August 3 Rabiʿul awwal 1207/19
Qarāmī (Shaikh 1692. Farrukhabad, UP October 1792. Shrine in
Qureshi) Farrukhabad, UP
70. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 2 Shawwāl 1103/17 June 3 Rajab 1207/4 February 1793.
Ḥashmat Jān 1692. Lucknow, UP Shrine in Lucknow, UP
(Mughal)
71. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 12 Shawwāl 1103/27 June 2 Shawwāl 1207/13 May 1793.
Mammun 1692. Bareilly. Shrine in Old Bareilly
(Butcher)
72. ʿAbd-i khās 13 Shawwāl 1100/31 July 11 Muḥarram 1209/8 August
Bī Namūdī 1689. Calcutta, Bengal 1794. Shrine in Calcutta
(Shaikh)
73. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 27 Zilḥajj 1102/21 September 14 Shʿabān 1209/6 March 1795.
Mughlo Begam 1691. Lucknow, UP Shrine in Lucknow, UP
(Carder).
Sufi Women Identified by Name Only 505

(cont.)

Name Date/place of birth Date of death

74. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 16 Safar 1109/3 September 21 Shawwāl 1209/11 May 1795.
Ābādi Begam 1697. Muradabad, UP Shrine in Muradabad, UP
(Majzūbā
Saiyyidānī)
75. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 22 Shʿabān 1103/9 May 1692. 11 Zilḥajj 1211/7 June 1797.
Bano Begam Saharanpur, UP Shrine in Saharanpur, UP
(Shaikh Farūqi)
76. ʿAbd-i khās 2 Safar 1113/9 July 1701. 22 Shʿabān 1212/9 February
Bī Burhano Dhaka, Bengal 1798. Shrine in Dhaka, Bengal
(Ironsmith)
77. ʿAbd-i khās 27 Rajab 1111/18 January 12 Shʿabān, 1211/12 January
Karānī Begam 1700. Patna, Bihar 1702. Shrine in Patna, Bihara
(Mughal)
78. ʿAbd-i khās Sītā 2 Safar 1102/5 November 14 Shʿabān 1213/21 January
Rāmjani (Jāt, 1690. Muradabad, UP 1799. Shrine in Muradabad,
nau- Muslim) UP
79. ʿAbd-i khās 16 Rajab 1119/13 October 22 Shʿabān 1213/29 January
Ghurbat Begam 1707. Faizabad, UP 1799. Shrine in Faizabad, UP
80. ʿAbd-i khās 13 Ramaẓān 1102/10 June 27 Ziqʿad 1213/2 May 1799.
Jammo Dīwānī 1691. Muradabad, UP Shrine in Muradabad, UP
(Bundela Rajput
Muslim).
81. ʿAbd-i khās 27 Ramaẓān 1105/22 May 3 Rajab 1215/20 November
Bī Raḥm Jān 1694. Farrukhabad, UP 1800. Shrine in Farrukhabad,
(Sayyidani). near the riverbank
82. ʿAbd-i khās 13 Rajab 1121/18 September 11 Shʿabān 1215/28 December
Bī Amīran 1709. Dhaka, Bengal 1800. Shrine in Dhaka, Bengal
(Sayyidani)

a This is a doubtful date. Perhaps the copyist made a mistake here. I assume that it should
be 1213 because all the dates immediately preceding this entry and following it, are for the
year 1213.
506 Chapter 12

(cont.)

Name Date/place of birth Date of death

83. ʿAbd-i khās 16 Ramaẓān 1127/15 22 Ziqʿad 1215/6 April 1801.

Muḥabbatuʾn September 1715. Faizabad, Shrine in Faizabad, UP
nisāʾ (Fārūqī UP
Shaikh).
84. ʿAbd-i khās 16 Zilḥajj 1103/29 August 27 Shawwāl 1216/2 March 1802.
Bī Khūbi Jī 1692. Dhaka, Bengal Shrine in Dhaka, Bengal
(Weaver).
85. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 13 Ziqʿad 1117/26 February 7 Shʿabān 1218/22 November
ʿAzīmuʾn nisāʾ 1706. Pīlībhīt, UP 1803. Shrine in Pīlībhīt, UP
(Sadāt)
86. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 27 Shawwāl 1207/7 June 21 Ramaẓān 1222/22 November
Kallo (Carder by 1793. Murshidabad, Bengal 1807. Shrine in Murshidabad,
profession). Bengal
87. ʿAbd-i khās 7 Muḥarram 1120/29 March 11 Zilḥajj 1227/16 December
Bī Zahūran 1708. Dhaka, Bengal 1812. Shrine in Dhaka, Bengal
(Carder)
88. ʿAbd-i khās 12 Shawwāl 1111/3 April 1700. 27 Rajab 1245/22 January 1830.
Bī Karīman Pīlībhīt, UP Shrine in Pīlībhīt, UP
(Siddiqui
Shaikh)
89. ʿAbd-i khās 27 Rajab 1144/25 January 22 Ramaẓān 1245/17 March
Nizāmuʾn-nisāʾ 1732. Agra, UP 1830. Shrine in Agra, UP
(Mughal)
90. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 19 Ziqʿad 1195/6 November 27 Shʿabān 1249/9 January
ʿAʾishā (Turk) 1781. Rampur, UP 1834. Shrine in Rampur, UP
91. ʿAbd-i khās 27 Zilḥajj 1193/5 January 7 Safar 1255/17 April 1839.
Bī Māʿsūma 1780. Shahabad, Rampur, Shrine in Shahabad, Rampur,
(Afghan) UP UP
92. ʿAbd-i khās Bī 16 Ramaẓān 1203/10 June 16 Shawwāl 1267/14 August
Anārā (Afghan) 1789. Rampur, UP 1851. Shrine in Bilaspur
Darwaza, Rampur, UP
93. ʿAbd-i khās Bībī 13 Ramaẓān 1201/29 June 11 Rabiʿul awwal 1272/21
Munawwara 1787. Agra, UP November 1855. Shrine in
(Sadāt) Delhi
Conclusions

To conclude this book, which has been years in the making, perhaps I could
do no better than to reproduce here the words of Ghulām ʿAbdu’l-Qādir Nāzir,
the official scribe of Bahār-i-ʿᾹzam Jāhī, an early nineteenth-century travel
diary of the pilgrimage of ʿĀzam Jāh Bahādur Nawab Wālājāh IV of Carnatic
(1820–1825). In his brief notice of Turta-turt Bībī, a woman Sufi, whose details
remain unknown, Nāzir describes extraordinary circumstances in which
Turta-turt Bībī’s grave was discovered. When near the foundations of the fort
for constructing anew the city wall, while digging alongside the Natharnagar
gate, her hidden grave was struck by chance. The grave was disturbed, and
blood began to ooze out. The diggers excavated further, and the body of a
woman (mastūra-yi ʿiffat nishāṅ), dressed in white robes and reposing in
peace (bākhwāb rāḥat ast), was sighted. The diggers immediately covered the
ground (māʿan pinhāṅ sākhta). Nāzir writes: “Such women who may be styled
as Rābiʿa’s of their days are too many…. There are no traces of them. May Allah
bless us with their help.” He concludes by commenting that there are many
more friends of Allāh, pious (awliyāʾ, ṣulahāʾ, wa darwishāṅ) about whom we
know nothing and whose memories are lost (khāk-i tīra rafta).1 But we know
that God-aware and God-loving women have been present throughout history
in all regions of South Asia.
Accounting for the lives of women of the past is an arduous task for histori-
ans. The lives of mystic women become more obscure since the pious women
chose to remain veiled and hidden. Acceptance and recognition of Sufi women
as equal members of the mystic community was not unproblematic for the
male Sufis. The preceding overview of the Sufi perception of women has veri-
fied it. The Sufi texts, through two types of documentation, i.e., written and
oral, further developed and strengthened the Sufi Shaikh’s averseness for
women, including Sufi women. On the one hand, there is the issue of omis-
sion, suppression, and evasion of public disclosure of the lives of women. On
the other hand, since almost all of the entries in this book have come from the
scattered and sparse references in Sufi textual sources—created within and
nourished by the social religious paradigms that cherish veiling women—it
is warranted to ask what religious codes, social patterns, and mystical trends
caused this fragmented information. The preceding sections have responded

1 ʿAbdu’l-Qādir Nāzir, Ghulām. 1961. Bahār-i ʿᾹzam Jāhī: rūdād-i safar-i maimanat asr-i Nawāb
ʿᾹzam Jāh Bahādur. (Written in 1823 in Farsi and edited by Muhammad Yusuf Kokan Usmani.
Madras: Electric Press), p. 178.

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_015

508 Conclusions

to these questions and in turn have generated more queries, thus calling for a
thoughtful reading of the contents of this book.
Thus, as the Sufi women’s notices in this book verify, the piety of these
women was not bounded by the institutions of organised Sufism. They
expressed their devotion for Allāh and His Prophet outside the formalities of a
ṭarīqa. As the narratives show, all these pious women were not formally initi-
ated into a silsila. A woman friend of Allāh (awliyāʾ Allāh) embarks on her jour-
ney (sulūk) towards the Divine alone because each person stands responsible
for their actions and therefore is rewarded or punished accordingly.
Instead of rigorous asceticism and self-mortification, Sufi women cherished
life without indulging in it. Those who went through initiation did it primarily
for self-guidance and as a mark of baraka. Indeed, asceticism and renuncia-
tion are not the practices of all the silsilas. Indeed, all male Sufis neither relin-
quished their families nor turned away from riches. They did not direct their
disciples and followers to give up their professions (kasb). Therefore, it would
be erroneous and misleading to characterise and assess Sufi women’s practices
as replicas of the mystical path of the male Sufis. Moving beyond and discard-
ing the tradition of applying males as a yardstick to measure women, pious
and virtuous women’s mode of piety and their trust in Allāh is instead found
in their inner self, in the core of their heart (lubb). This deepest and innermost
locus of God is not for public display; it remains veiled.
It becomes clear from the biographical notices of Sufi women and from the
analysis of the Sufi Shaikh’s perception of women’s spiritual experiences that
there were two different understandings of following the path of taṣawwuf.
The acclaimed Sufi Shaikhs, who were acknowledged as mainstream guides
of Sufism, projected taṣawwuf within the frame of Sufi institutions with an
emphasis on following (taqlīd) the word and practice of authority, in this case,
the Shaikh of the silsila and of the ṭarīqa. Pious and devout women, fulfilling
the obligations of their social milieu, lived as mothers and wives, or as unmar-
ried women, followed the path of taṣawwuf differently. This path was not an
alternative to the path followed by Sufi males. Instead, their path was a min-
gling of the mystical modes of piety with the mundane life which they under-
stood as a Divine gift to them and as the ultimate site to test their love for God.
Thus, synthesising love for the Divine with love for children and other family
members—which in the eyes of Sufi men worked as detractors, derailing their
piety—Sufi women followed taṣawwuf in its truest form. Sufi men and Sufi
women, therefore, demonstrated their love and expressed their gratitude for
Allāh on two different platforms. The Sufi men healed bruised and fractured
morals and social ethos through a vigilantly monitored murīd-murshid—a
Conclusions 509

master-disciple relationship controlled by written codes of behaviour for the

novice as well as the mentor, both living on the premises of the hospice. Sufi
women remained tied to the home, not because they were mandated to do so;
for them, home was the prime location, requiring a spiritual therapeutic cure
for the moral and social sufferings, which, if left untreated, turn into much
larger problems.
As discussed, in light of the reported words of male Sufis, the male Sufi
perception of women was not generously welcoming, at times to the extreme
extent of abhorring and dreading their physical presence and proximity. At the
same time, Sufi men and Sufi women did not exist in complete isolation from
each other. Also, all Sufi males were neither celibate nor shunned, nor did they
relinquish their family responsibilities. Thus, it would be erroneous to claim
that the mysticism of South Asia turned women into outcasts.
Textual invisibility has not made Sufi women socially invisible. Despite their
obscurity in the texts and the missing historical references, women Sufis won
the hearts of their devotees. They avoided egoistic self-display (riyāʾ) and pride
(kibr) and fulfilled what is due to God—ḥuqūq Allāh (e.g., offering prayers,
sharing wealth with the needy, etc.). Thus, ascetic piety and deep yearning for
Allāh through His constant remembrance and by caring for the people were
arguably the most cherished qualities of women Sufis, and this resulted in
making bridges between them and other human beings, including men. The
founding fathers of the Chishtī silsila—Shaikh Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar
and his khalīfa Khwāja Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, and Shaikh Farīd’s younger
brother, Shaikh Muntajibu’d-Dīn—maintained close ties with Bībī Fāṭima
Sām. The last two had hours-long conversations with her at her house, where
she was mostly alone as her female attendant usually returned home by late
evenings. Similarly, the narrative of the sixteenth-century Kheshgī Pashtun
Sufi, Bībī Mahkalī, is another example that this book has recorded. Miyān
Akhund Saʿīd Shuryānī (d. 1018/1609), a contemporary Sufi who is said to have
received his khirqa from ʿAbul Ḥasan Kharaqani (d. 1033), remained so much in
her company that common and ignorant people began to taunt him. They said
that it was below the dignity of his spiritual status (shān-i wilayat) to remain
in a woman’s company. Miyān Akhund Saʿīd’s response to this public censure
is an answer to all similar queries regarding women’s spiritual status. He told
them, “O’ ignorant ones (nadān)! Don’t say this because Bībī Mahkalī is one
of the gnostics, pious, and learned women of her times (az ʿārifāt wa ṣāliḥāt
wa faẓliāt). When God distributed (taqsīm) greatness, blessings, holiness and
miracles (buzurgī wa barakāt wa wilāyat wa karamāt) upon the Kheshgīs, one
entire part of it was bestowed upon her (yak ḥiṣṣa tamām) and the remaining
510 Conclusions

two parts were given to the rest of the people.”2 The same is true in the case of
Māʾī Nūruʾn nisāʾ Begam (d. 1974). The number of her followers among male
Pakistani expatriates in the United Kingdom is considerably large and is grow-
ing. Thus, questioning women’s piety, weighing it against men’s piety and mea-
suring their stature with that of men, is not prudent.
This compassionate virtue of the Sufi women has generated a confluence
between them and the devout women who visit their shrines to seek their
blessings (baraka). The shrines of Sufi women, whether “authenticated” or
not by the written word, found almost all over the South Asian region, even in
the remotest locations, are open houses for unscheduled meetings, generat-
ing stronger and instant ties of camaraderie. Shrine visitation, in itself, func-
tions as a spiritual guide. At several shrines, I have conversed with women who,
without the least access to any type of formal education and living under acute
lack of resources, yet carry with them a flawlessly perfect understanding of
Sufism. Knowledge comes from inside, one woman told me, because knowl-
edge rests in our hearts (ʿilm dil main rahta hai). Another woman at the shrine
of Māʾī Mīrāṅ, in response to my asking how she came to know of her, said, “He
[God] alone guides us. Who else?”
Yet, for all its acceptance by women devotees of the spiritual charisma of
women Sufis, the stand of the traditional theologians, which is often shared
by the common men, remains nonacceptance. The manager of the shrine of
Umm-i Ḥabība, in Karachi, told me that the ʿurs celebration of women saints
is not permissible because women are not Sufis as men are. Interestingly, men
visitors also pray at the shrine of Umm-i Ḥabība and seek her blessings.
The canvas of this book is large, in terms of time period covered, areas
surveyed, and sources studied. Additionally, variegated cultural patterns, lin-
guistic differences, and multiple ethnicities had to be carefully assessed. I am
aware that such ambitious studies often leave some questions inadequately
or not at all answered. I must admit that the present work has its inadequa-
cies. However, I hope that these would inspire further studies that would be
more comprehensive, inclusive, and analytical, and that, in the end, the read-
ers of this book would feel encouraged to draw their own conclusions about
Sufi women.
2 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ. MS. no. R343, fols. 123b, 124a.
Glossary

abdāl plural of badal (substitutes); a category of the Sufi hierarchy

ʿābid religious devotee; worshipper
ādāb manners; etiquette
aḥwāl spiritual states
akhlāq ethics; moral qualities; character traits
ālayams shrines in the Tamil language
akhyār “the chosen ones,” a category of the Sufis
ammā mother
ʿārif gnostic; knower
burqāʿ A long, loose garment covering the whole body from head to feet, worn in
public by some Muslim women
darbār royal court; shrine
dunyā world
faqr poverty
fitna chaos
futūḥ unsolicited donations
ḥāzirī presence; state of being possessed
ʿilm learning; knowledge
ʿirfān gnosis
ijāzat authorisation to teach; permission
irādat discipleship
jazb absorption (in God); ecstatic state
kandūrī a feast held in honour of Bībī Fāṭima; a table cover
karāmāt saintly marvels (pl. of karāmat)
kashf revealed knowledge; unveiling
khādims attendants
khalīfa spiritual deputy (pl. khulafāʾ)
khānqāh Sufi lodges or hospices
khilāfat-namā letter of investiture
khirqā patched garment worn by male Sufis
kulāh the Sufi’s hat
langar soup kitchens; free meals
laṭīfā subtle centres of human consciousness
madrasa seminary; schools
majlis assembly
maqām mystical station; grave

© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2022 | doi:10.1163/9789004467187_016

512 Glossary

murīd spiritual disciple

murshid spiritual guide
murāqaba contemplation of God
mutawallīs superintendent or treasurer of a mosque or shrine
naf lower self
nekzan pious, chaste woman
nerchas the act of taking a vow at a shrine with festivities (Tamil language)
nijāt salvation; redemption
rijāl man
riẓā Ar. Ridā; satisfaction/perfect contentment
ṣabr patience
ṣālīḥāt pious women
sakr intoxication
sālik wayfarer on the Path (of Sufism) (feminine, sālika)
samāʿ listening; spiritual music; qawwāli
sawāb Divine reward; spiritual merit
shaikhas female Shaikhs
shahwat ordinary thoughts; lust or sensuality
shajara a genealogical table of a Sufi silsila, starting from the Prophet
silsila a chain of spiritual descent (literally, “chain,” a Sufi spiritual genealogy/
lineage)
sijda prostration
sajjāda-nishin successor of a Sufi shrine (literally, “sitting on the carpet”)
sīra life story
sulūk spiritual path
tabarruk derivation from the word barakā (Divine blessings)
tajarrud celibacy
tajallī theophany
tajrīd detachment
talqīn inculcation
talqīnu’l-zikr foundational formula of recollection of Allāh for training of Sufi
novice
taqwā fear of God; piety; abstinence
tafsīr exegesis
taqlīd imitation
ṭarīqa/ṭarīqat spiritual path
tarkā shrine in Tamil
ṭabaqāt classifications; generations
tawḥīd Divine Unity
Glossary 513

tazkira remembrance; recollections; biographical compendiums

taṣawwur-i shaikh visualising the Shaikh
tawajjuh spiritual attention; focus; Divine energy
tawakkul trust in God
taykal Tamil word for shrines
tazkiyatu’l nafs purification of the soul
ʿurs wedding; celebration of death-anniversary of Sufi
wajd ecstasy
walī friend of Allāh; saint
wilāyat spiritual authority; sainthood
warʿ abstinence from anything doubtful; wary of God
wilāya the state of being walī
zāhid ascetic
zāhir exoteric
zan woman
zikr (Arabic dhikr) recollection of Allāh
ziyārat pilgrimage
zuhd asceticism
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4 Primary Sources (Persian and Arabic)

4.1 Manuscripts
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1614 A.D. Islamabad: Markaz Taḥqiqāt-i Farsi Iran wa Pakistan.
Hamadānī, ʿAlī ibn Muḥammad (Edited by Abdul Qaiyyum Rafiqi). 2007. Letters of Mir
Saiyid ʿAlī Hamadani- Maktubāt-i-Mir Saiyid ʿAlī Hamadani: an annotated edition
with English translation and historical analysis. Srinagar, Kashmir: Gulshan Books.
Harāwī, Niʿmatu’llah. Tarikh-i-Khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i-Afghani (Originally com-
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by Muḥammad Imām-ad-Dīn, and Abdul Karim) Vol. 1. Dacca: Asiatic Society of

Pakistan, 1960.
Harāwī, Khwāja Niʿmatu’llah. 1962. Tarikh-i-Khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i-Afghani: (Origi-
nally completed in 161, A complete history of the Afghans in Indo-Pak subcontinent
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of Pakistan.
Ḥasan ʿAlā Sijzi Dihlawī, Amīr. 1302/1885. Fawāʾidu’l-fu’ād. Lucknow: Munshi Nawal
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Hujwīrī Ghaznawī, Abu’l Ḥasan Saiyyid ʿAlī b. Usmān. 2007. Kashfu’l-Mahjūb (nuskhā-yi
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Jāmī, ʿAbdur Raḥman and William Nassau Lees. 1858. Nafaḥāt al-uns. Calcutta: Matbaʿ
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Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī, Shāh 2001. Muraqqaʿ-i Kalīmī: maʿ Urdū tarjama. Lahore: Farīd
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Khusraw, Amīr. 1287/1870. khāliq bārī sarjan hār. Lucknow: Maṭbaʿ Nawal Kishore.
Lahorī, Ghulām Sarwar. 1290/1873. Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyāʾ, jild awwal and jild dom. Lucknow:
Maṭbaʿ Samar-i Hind.
Lees, Captain W. Nassau, Mawlawis Khadim Hosain and ʿAbd-al Ha‌ʾi (Edited). 1864. The
Tabaqaāt-i Nāsiri of Aboo ʿOmar Mināj al-dīn ʿOthman Ibn Sirāj-al-dīn -al-Jawzjāni.
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Makkī, Imdādu’llah. 1332/1914. Ẓiāʾu’l qulūb. Lucknow: Maṭbaʿ Aḥmadī.
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Manerī, Shaikh Sharfuddīn Yaḥyā. 1885. Maktūbāt Ḥaẓrat Shaikh Sharfu’d-Dīn Yāḥyā
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Manjhu, Sikandar ibn Muḥammad. 1308/1890. Mirāt-i Sikandarī. Bombay: Maṭbāʿ
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Matu, Mullā Bahāu’d-Dīn. 1223/1832. Rishī namā (Edited by Muhammad Asadullah
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Muḥammad Wāʾiẓī, ʿAbdu’l ʿAzīz b. Sher Malik. Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī wa Tazkirā yi Murshidī.
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(Persian text with Urdu translation by Khwajā Ḥasan Nizāmi Dihlawi) Dihlī: Urdū
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Qiwām, Muḥammad Jamāl. Qiwāmu’l-ʿaqā’id. (MS in Osmania University, Hyderabad).
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Quṭbu’d-Dīn Bakhtiyār Kākī, Khwajā. 1889. Dalilu’l-ʿārifīn. Kanpur: Nawal Kishore.
Rafiqi, Abdu’l Qayyūm (Edited). 2007. Maktūbāt Saiyyid ʿAlī Hamadānī. Srinagar:
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Sāmānī, Shāh Muḥammad ʿAlī. 831/1427, Siyar-i Muḥammadī (along with Urdu transla-
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Shirāzī, Mirza Mehdi. 1889. Kitāb-i tazkirāt al-khwatīn dar sharaḥ-i ḥāl-i mashāhīr-i
niswāni ʿālam az ʿArab wa Rūm wa Hind wa ʿAjam az ṣadr-i Islām tā kunūn mush-
tamal bar awṣāf-i ḥamīdah wa ṣifāt-i pasandīdah-i-i ʿānhā wa ʿash‘ārī kih dar ʿArabī
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Thattawī, Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ. 1304/1887. Tārikh-i Nayāb-Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām, (all three vol-
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Thattawī, Mīr ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ. 1304/1887. Tuḥfatu’l-Kirām. Lucknow: MaṭbaʿAsna‌ʾ
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Haidrabad, Dakkan: Maṭbaʿ-yi Saiyyidī.

4.2.2 Arabic
Āzād Bilgrāmī, Ghulām ʿAlī. 1884. Subḥat al-Marjan fī asār Hindustan. Bombay: M.S.
Maḥmūd.
Ghazālī, Abū Ḥāmid Muḥammad. 1937. Ihya‌ʾ ʿUlūm al-Dīn. Vol. 4. Cairo: Matbaʿat lajnat
nashr al-thaqafa-Islāmiyya.
Kalābādhī, Abū Bakr Muḥammad ibn-Isḥāq, and Arthur J. Arberry. 1352/1933. Kitāb at
Taʿarruf li-madhab ahl al-taṣawwuf. Miṣr: Matbaʿat as-Saʿāda.
Muttaqī, ʿAlī ibn ʿAbd al-Malik. (Edited by Majdi al-Saiyyid Ibrahim). 1992. al-ʿunwān fi
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Suhrawardī, ʿAbd al-Qāhir ibn ʿAbd Allāh, Aḥmad ʿAbd al-Raḥīm Sāyiḥ, and Tawfīq ʿAlī
Wahbah. 2006. ‘Awārifu’l-maʿārif. al-Qāhirah: Maktabat al-Thaqāfah al-Dīnīyah.

4.2.3 Urdu (Translations of Arabic/Persian Primary Sources, including

Manuscripts)
ʿAbdul Ahad, Muḥammad. 1319/1901. Panch Ganj-Malfūzāt Khwājgān-i-Chisht ahl-i
bihisht. Dehli: Matbaʿ Mujtabāʾī.
ʿAbdu’l ʿAzīz, Shāh. Malfūzāt Shāh ʿAbdul ʿAziz (including Kamālāt-i ʿAzīzī) (Translated
by Maulawī ʿAzmat Ilāhī). Meeruth: Maṭbaʿ Hāshmi, 1897. [First published, 1896].
Also, translation by Maulawī Muḥammad ʿAlī Luṭfī and Mufti Intizām Ullah
Shāhābi. Karachi: Pakistan Educational Publishers Ltd., 1960).
ʿAbdu’l ʿAzīz Muḥaddis Dihlawi, Shāh. 1408/1988. Fatāwā-yi ʿAzīzī (Kāmil). Karachi:
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Index

Honorific titles for women are not transposed: Bībī Rānī is indexed under Bībī.
Honorific titles for men are mostly omitted from the index, but are retained in some case
for easier identification or when they are an intrinsic part of the name. In the first case they are
transposed: Shaikh Allāh is indexed under Allāh. When honoric titles are an intrinsic part of the
name they not transposed: Amīr Khwurd is indexed under Amīr.

Abbas, Shemeem Burney 19 Abdus Salām Khaljī Samarqandī Qureshī

ʿAbbās ʿAlī/ʿAbbās Makkī/Gorā Chānd 378
Shāh 42, 107, 251–252 ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad b. Afẓal Aḥmad 35, 407–408
ʿAbbāsī, Maḥmūd Aḥmad 299 ʿĀbid Sanāmi, Muḥammad 290
ʿAbdul ʿAzīz Dihlawī (d. 1823/1824) 97–98, Abū Bakr Ṣiddīq 160
137–138, 144–145, 197, 294 Abū Bakr Ṭūsī Qalandarī 138, 183
ʿAbdu’l Fatḥ 374 Abū Isḥāq Kazārūnī 38n26
ʿAbdul Ḥakīm 292–293 Abu Muzaffar Aḥmad Shāh, Sultan of
ʿAbdul Jalīl Chauhaŕ Bandagī 262 Gujarat 375
ʿAbdu’l Laṭīf Bhittai (Bhit Shāh) 19, 475 Abu Naṣr Pārsa 207, 339
ʿAbdu’l Qādir Badaoni 107, 402n293 Abu Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī, Aḥmad.
ʿAbdu’l Qādir Gilānī (d. 1166) 42, 269, 282, ‌ʿAbdu’llah 65
297–298, 454, 477, 478n12, 481, 483 Abū Saʿīd Abu’l Khair 206
ʿAbdu’l Qādir Sālis b. Saiyyid Muḥammad Abū Saʿīd Aqṭāʾ 118
Bālā Pīr Gīlānī 257 Abū Yazīd al-Basṭāmī 65–66, 70, 195
ʿAbdul Wahid Bilgrāmī 36 Abu Yazīd Shaṭṭārī Burhanpurī 420
ʿAbdu’līd, Muḥammad 244–245 Abu’l Faiẓ Zu’l-nūn b. Ibraḥīm al-Miṣrī 69
ʿAbdulādir, Saiyyid b. Saiyyid Hāshim 385, Abu’l Fatḥ Shamsu’d-Dīn Muḥammad
387 al-Qādirī 261, 270–271
ʿAbdu’l-Ḥaqq Muḥaddis Dihlawī Abu᾽l Faẓl Junaidī 433
(d. 1642/1643) Abu’l Ḥasan Fakhrābādi 273
disciples of 74 Abu’l Ḥasan Nūrī 48–49
sources of 62 Abu’l Ḥasan Samnūn b. ʿAbdullah
views of al-Khawwās 69
on Bībī Fāṭima Sām 412 Abu’l Lais al-Samarqandī 113
on Bībī Sāra 393, 394 Abu’l Qāsim Gurgāni (d. 450 or 469) 40
on Dārā Shikūh 402 Abu’ḷayāt Qādirī, Muḥammad 296–298
on Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī 219–220 Abu’l-Faiẓ (grandson of Gīsū Darāz) 435
on slave girls/maidservants 142 ādāb (etiquette)
on women 74, 126–127 in general xii
works of, Akhbāru’l Akhyār fī Asrāru’l- for attending discourse
Abrār 62, 72–73, 74, 126–127, 142, assemblies 56–57
219–220, 393, 394, 412 for khalīfas 51
Abdullah Shāh Ghāzī 28, 193 for novices 155
ʿAbdur Raḥīm (d. 1719) 157, 294, 295–296 for shrine visitation 85–86
ʿAbdur Raḥīm Khān Khānān (d. 1627) 128, Adam, Prophet
130, 420 fall from Paradise xi, 90, 91, 100
ʿAbdur Razzāq 403 in India 35, 37
568 Index

ʿĀdil Shāh 421 ʿAlī b. al-Jawzī 66, 175

adultery 103, 129 ʿAlī Datār, Mirāṅ Saiyyid 461, 462, 464–465,
advice to women 470
by Amīr Khusraw 81–82, 109 see also Chilla of ʿAlī Datār, Mirāṅ Saiyyid
by Sirhindī, Aḥmad 128–129 ʿAlī Muḥammad ibn-i Muḥammad Muʿīn
Aḥmad, Bashīruddīn 83, 231, 376–377, 377, 169–170
428, 430 Āl-i Muḥammad, Saiyyid (d. 1729) 291
Aḥmad, Khwāja (husband of Bībī ʿAlīmu᾽d-Dīn Ṣābir (d. 1291) 363
Zulaikhā) 396 Allāh, Shaikh (husband of Bībī
Aḥmad, Muftī Rashīd 4 Daulat) 340–341
Aḥmad, Shafīq 269 Allahdād, Shaikh (father of Bebe
Ahmad, Syed 428–429 Nekbakhta) 445
Aḥmad b. Khalīlu’llah Qādirī 367 Amīn, Muḥammad 352
Ahmad b. Khiẓrūya al-Balkhi 70 Amīr Khusraw
Aḥmad Bādpā (Miran Shāh) 268–270 advice to daughter 81–82, 109
Aḥmad Gangohī, Rashīd 157–159 children of 81n108
Aḥmadu’llah, Maulawī (son of Ajība identities of 34–35
Khānam) 331 interactions/relationships of, with
Ahmedabad (Gujarat), forgotten Sufi women Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 2, 80, 82
from 496–497 poetry of 35
Aḥrār, Ubaidullah 43, 108, 378 views of 2, 35
Aḥsanu’l aqwāl (Kāshānī) 93, 121, 138, 143, views on, of Amīr Khwurd 80, 82
144, 183 works attributed to
ʿAinu’d-Dīn Ganju’l ʿIlm Junaidī 245–246 Hasht Bihisht 81–82, 109
ʿĀʾisha (wife of Prophet) 21, 160 Khāliq bāri 36
ʿAjība Khānam 171, 327–331 Maṭlaʿ ʿul-anwār 81
Akbāru’l awliyāʾ min lisānu’l aṣfiyāʾ (Kheshgī) Naṣiḥat farzand 109
see Kheshgī, ʿAbdu’llah Amīr Khwurd
Akhbāru’l Aṣfiyā (ʿAbduṣ Ṣamad b. Afẓal views of
Aḥmad) 35, 407–408 on Amīr Khusraw 80, 82
Akhbāru’l-Akhyār fī Asrāru’l-Abrār ( Dihlawī) on Bībī Fāṭima 363
see ʿAbdu’l-Ḥaqq Muḥaddis Dihlawī on Bībī Fāṭima Sām 413–414
ʿĀlam, Muḥammad Makhdūm 297–298 on Bībī Khadīja 107, 220–221
Alam, Muzaffar 61 on Bībī Mastūra 362–363
ʿĀlam Khan 277–278 on Bībī Qarsum Khātūn 383
alams (wooden cribs) 439 on Bībī Rānī 222, 223–224
Alāʾu’d-Dīn (grand-son of Bībī ʿĀʾisha) 230 on Bībī Sharīfa 166, 363
ʿAlāʾu’d-Dīn Ḥasan Gangū, Sulṭān of the on Bībī Zulaikhā 395, 396, 398, 399
Bahmani kingdom 43, 232–233, 234 on daughters of Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i
ʿAlāu’d-Dīn Khiljī, Sulṭān of Delhi 189, 443 Shakkar 231
ʿAlāu’d-Dīn Ṣābir 453, 454 on Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar 132,
ʿAlāʾud-Dīn Uṣūlī 141–142 223
Alāʾu’d-Dīn Ẓiyāʾ 147 on Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 100–101
ʿAlī, Khwāja (Bībī Zulaikhā father-in-law) works of
396 Siyaru’l Awliyāʾ 60, 71, 80, 100–101,
ʿAlī, Rawnaq 227–230, 252 107, 166, 220–221, 222, 223–224, 363,
ʿAlī Aḥmad Ṣābir (d. 790 or 764) 116, 231 395, 398, 399
ʿAlī b. Abu Ṭālib 105, 113, 289 credibility of 363–364
Index 569

Amma Bībī Maryam 458–460, 458–459 Āzād Bilgrāmī, Ghulām‌ʿAlī 37, 125, 291, 244,
Amma Bī/Maḥmūdā Bībī 492–493, 492 291, 371, 415
Amma Khairuʾn-nisāʾ 456–457, 456 ʿAzam Jāh Bahādur Nawāb Wālājāh iv 323,
Anantha Raman, Sita 283 325, 414–415, 507
Andrae, Tor 123 ʿAzīzu’d-Dīn (son of Bībī Khadīja) 221
Anfāsu’l‌ʿĀrifīn (Walīullah Dihlawī) 157, ʿAzīzu’d-Dīn Amjharī 297
294–296 ʿAzīzullah Mutāwakkil 278
animals, talking with 353
Anīsu’l Arwāh (attr. Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī) Bābā Farīd see Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar
112–113, 114 (Bābā Farīd)
Annual report of the Director of Archaeology Bābā Nekī Rishī 351–353
(Sastri) 313 Bābā Qāsim 490
Ansari, Z. 82 Bābā Sattār 155
ʿArab, Khwāja (father of Bībī Zulaikhā) 396 Badakhshī, Mullā Shah 75, 449, 451–452
ʿĀrif, Muḥammad 418–419 Badayunī, Nūr Muḥammad 195
Armughān-i S‌ ulṭānī‌al-maʿrūf‌sair-i Badīʿu’d-Dīn Madār 268–269
(Muḥammad Sulṭān) 225, 233, 234, Badru’d-Dīn ʿĀlam Zāhidī 357
326, 377, 433–434 Badru’d-Dīn Ghaznawī 131
Arnold, T.W. 292–293, 307, 312 Badru’d-Dīn Qādirī 261
Asani, Ali S. 19–20 Bādshāh Begam 328
Āsarāt Phulwari sharīf mausūm ba Aʿyān-i- Bahār-i‌ʿĀzam ‌Jāhī (Nāzir) 323, 325, 414,
waṭn (Saiyyid Muḥammad Shuʿaib) 297 507
Āsāruʾs Sanādīd (Ahmad ) 427–428, 429 Bahāʾu’d-Dīn Gudriyā Faqīr 272
al-Ashqānī, Abu’l ʿAbbās 40 Bahāʾu’d-Dīn Mattu 248, 352, 353
Ashraf, Saiyyid Sulaimān 82 Bahāʾu’d-Dīn Naqshband 338
Asiatic Society of Bengal 242 Bahāʾu’d-Dīn Zakarīyya 42, 93–94, 108, 139,
āsitānās 317, 485 146, 185, 217, 262, 387, 389, 400, 401,
Asrāru’l awliyā’ (attr. Isḥāq) 61, 393 402, 403
Asyūtī, ʿAbd al-Raḥmān 179 Bahāu’l-ḥaqq Khāṣṣa-yi Khudā Amethwī
At the Shrine of the Red Sufi: Five Days 401
and Nights on Pilgrimage in Pakistan Bahawalpur Gazetteer 241
(Frembgen) 20 Bahjo (prostitute) 144–145
ʿAṭāʾ Ḥussain,‌ʿAbdur āq 208, 301, 382 Bahlul Lodi 275n256
ʿAṭā’u’llāh Sirhindi Bukhārī 334 Bahmani, Sulṭān Maḥmūd 376–377
ʿAṭṭār, Farīdu’d-Dīn Bahr-e-Zakhkhar (Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf) see
views of under Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf
on Rābiʿa (daughter of Kʿāb) 206 Bāʾī Jī 427–428
on women 15, 89, 117–118 Balochistan, forgotten Sufi women
works of from 495–496
Ilāhi‌nāmā 206 Bandā Nawāz 190
Pand nāma 117 Bānu Zuhrā Khatūn/Rābiʿa of Bengal
Tazkiratu’l Awliyāʾ 66–67, 162 332–333
autobiographies 63, 75–76, 448 Bāqī Billah 43, 108, 127, 340–341, 378–380
see also under specific autobiographies Baranī, Ẓiyāʾu’d-Dīn 149
Awadhi dialect 36 Barelwī, Aḥmad Raza Khan Fāzil (d. 1921)
ʿAwārifu’l-maʿārif (Suhrawardī) 154, 175–176 161, 162, 198
ʿAwfī, Sadīduʿd Din Muḥammad 205, 207 Barelwī, Aḥmad Shahīd (d. 1831) 332
Awliyāʾ-i Afghānī (Imāmu’d-Dīn Ghoryāl) Baŕī Buā/Bībī Būbū Abādī 96, 234–238
445 Baŕī Ṣāḥiba/Bībī Naʿīma 110, 367–368
ʿAynu’l-Quẓāt Hamadānī 105 Barkatu’llah, Saiyyid 291n327
570 Index

Barlas, Asma 6, 91 Bībī Fāṭima (daughter of the Prophet) 285,

Basṭāmī, Bāyazīd 65, 70, 163, 195, 419–420 338, 360, 418
Basu, Helene 194 Bībī Fāṭima (from Bidar) 261
Bāwa Gor 193, 194 Bībī Fāṭima (mother of Miyāṅ Mīr)
Bayly, Susan 85, 325–326 368–370
beating, of disobedient wives 114–115 Bībī Fāṭima Saiyyida Gilānī 257–260
Bebe Nekbakhta 63, 445–447 Bībī Fāṭima Sām 406–414
Beemā Bīwī 41–42, 304–305 interactions/relationships of
Beglar, J.D. 211, 212 with Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i
Behat Bībī 254–255 Shakkar 407, 509
Believing Women in Islam: Unreading with Muntajibu’d-Dīn 509
Patriarchal Interpretations of the Qurʾān with Najību’d-Dīn Mutāwakkil 407,
(Barlas) 6 408
Bengal, forgotten Sufi women from 497 with Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 23–24,
Bhakkari, Muhammad Mʿāsūm 369 407, 509
Bhīkājī Qādirī, ʿAbdu’llah 417 maidservant of 137
Bhikārī Chishtī, Shāh 182, 421–422 Bībī Fāṭima (wife of Shamsu’d-Dīn)
Bhit Shāh (ʿAbdu’l Laṭīf Bhittai) 19, 475 239–240
Bī Amma Ṣāḥiba 423–425 Bībī Fāṭima/Bībī Ḥajiānī 305–306, 322
Bī Mayya xii Bībī Gauhar 437–438
Bībī Abdāl/Khujasta Akhtar 356–358 Bībī Ḥabībā/Jiyya 210
Bībī Āghā (wife of Muḥammad Bībī Hadyā 210
Ṣiddique) 380 Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl 109, 166, 341–343
Bībī ʿĀiʾsha (daughter of Bībī Ḥājara) 44, Bībī Ḥājara/Mā Ṣāḥiba 371–372
249–250, 371 daughters of 43–44, 249, 371
Bībī ʿĀʾisha (daughter of Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i shrine of 44, 371, 372
Shakkar) 43, 226–232, 381 sons of 43, 116, 249, 371
Bībī Ajjī Ṣāḥiba 287–288 see also Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb;
Bībī Allāh Dī 421–422 Muntajibu’d-Dīn
Bībī Āmna (daughter of Bībī Ḥājara) 44, Bībī Ḥāji 438
249–250, 371 Bībī Ḥajiānī/Bībī Fāṭima 305–306, 322
Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr 404–406 Bībī Ḥalīma (daughter of Khusḥāl Khan
Bībī Ashraf Jahāṅ Ḥaẓrat Mā Ṣāḥiba 42–43, Khattak) 365–366
232–234 Bībī Ḥalīma/Bībī Tanūrī (daughter of Masʿūd
Bībī ʿĀṣima 288–289 Quraishi) 438
Bībī Awliyāʾ 73, 215–216 Bībī Ḥamīda (daughter of Bībī Ḥājara) 44,
Bībī Badī 369 249–250, 371
Bībī Bandagī Ḥusainī 276–277 Bībī Ḥūr 400, 437–438
Bībī Bānu (wife of Muḥammad Ṣādiq) 380 Bībī Ḥurmat Khatūn 299
Bībī Bebe 354–356 Bībī Ḥusnu 299
Bībī Būbū Abādī/Baŕī Buā 96, 234–238 Bībī Huzaira Khātūn 118, 362
Bībī Daulat 340–341 Bībī Islām Khāno/Khātūn 170–171, 344–347
Bībī Daulat/Bībī Kamāl Sānī 210 Bībī Jamāl (daughter of Shihābu’d-Dīn/
Bībī Durrā Quṣūrī 277–278 Pīr‌Jug) 210
Bībī Duyā 216–217 Bībī Jamāl Khātūn/Bībī Jīv (sister of Miyāṅ
Bībī Fāṭima (daughter of Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Mīr) 75, 109, 110, 368, 369
Shakkar) 231, 363, 381 Bībī Jamīla Mastānī 489
Index 571

Bībī Jawindī/Zinda Ahadi 84, 240–243 Bībī Ᾱrām Ḥaṣūr 107

Bībī Jīū/Jī 110, 372–376 Bībī Rānī (from Thatta, Pakistan) 272–273
Bībī Jīv/Bībī Jamāl Khātūn (sister of Miyāṅ Bībī Rānī (grandmother of Amīr Khwurd)
Mīr) 75, 109, 110, 368, 369 222–225, 364
Bībī Jīyā 291 Bībī Rānī (mother of Gīsū Darāz) 111
Bībī Johda see Bībī Abdāl/Khujasta Akhtar Bībī Rāstī (wife of Wais Sarwānī) 432–433
Bībī Kalāṅ/Bībī Qayyūmi/Bībī Ṣāḥiba 159, Bībī Rāstī/Bībī Pākdāman 42, 108, 218,
172, 333–339 384–391, 385, 386, 388, 390
Bībī Kamāl Sānī/Bībī Daulat 210 Bībī Raushan Ārāʾ 42, 107, 251–252
Bībī Kamāla/Bībī Khunza [Khunjā] Bībī Raẓā Khātūn 117n50
Sulṭāna 376–378 Bībī Raẓiā/Baŕī Būā (daughter of Pīr‌Jug) 210
Bībī Kamāl/Kamālo 26–27, 85, 208–214 Bībī Raẓiya (mother of Manerī) 133
Bībī Khadīja (daughter of Bībī Ḥājara) 44, Bībī Ruqayya 400
249–250, 371 Bībī Ṣāḥiba Surkhposh 321
Bībī Khadīja (wife of Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Bībī Ṣāḥiba/Bībī Kalāṅ/Bībī Qayyūmi 159,
Suwāli) 107, 218–222 172, 333–339
Bībī Khunza [Khunjā] Sulṭāna/Bībī Bībī Saiyyidānī/Saidānī Ṣaḥiba 319
Kamāla 376–378 Bībī Ṣajīnī 283–284
Bībī Khwānd Mā Ṣ̣āḥiba/Māh Bībī Sāra 26, 41, 73, 391–395, 413
Khātūn 245–246 Bībī Shāhbāz 437–438
Bībī Khwānja Batūl Khātūn 180, 436 Bībī Shaikhī Durkhānī 319–320
Bībī Khwurd/Bībī Lohri 415–416 Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima 284–285, 286–287
Bībī Lahrī (sister of Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Bībī Shaikhzādī 320–321
Chirāgh-i Dihlī) 236 Bībī Shamsa Mā Ṣāḥiba 273
Bībī Lohri/Bībī Khwurd 415–416 Bībī Shamsuʾn-nisāʾ 301
Bībī Mahkalī 267–268, 509–510 Bībī Sharīfa (daughter of Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i
Bībī Māhlat 279–281 Shakkar) 362–365
Bībī Māhnau 268–270 deprivation of khilāfat 1–2, 11, 109,
Bībī Makhdūma 120, 400–404 166–167, 364–365
Bībī Mammi 281–282 mention of 231, 381
Bībī Maryam Bukhārī Shahīd 460–461 Bībī Ṣūrat 274–276
Bībī Maryam (daughter of Bībī Ḥājara) 44, Bībī Tāj 437–438
249–250, 371 Bībī Tanūrī/Bībī Ḥalīma 438
Bībī Mastūra (daughter of Farīdu’d-Dīn Bībī Tārī 321–323
Ganj-i Shakkar) 231, 362–363, 381 Bībī Ummat Allāh 342
Bibi Nāhzan/Bībī Nekzan 312–313 Bībī Umm-i Ḥabība 470–471, 471
Bībī Naʿīma/Baŕī Ṣāḥiba 110, 367–368 Bībī Wajīha 288
Bībī Nānī 310–312 Bībī Walīya 296–298
Bībī Nawāzan 430 Bībī Yasso 286–287
Bībī Nekzan/Bībī Nāhzan 312–313 Bībī Zainab 400
Bībī Nūr 400, 437–438 Bībī Zulaikhā 73, 110, 139, 326, 395–400,
Bībī Nūrbharī 431 398, 413
Bībī Peroz Khātūn 495–496 Bībī Zulaikhā (Gulbarga) 326
Bībī Qādirīyyā 282–283 Bībīaṅ Pākdāman 489–490
Bībī Qarsum Khātūn (mother of Bābā Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ 437–441, 440
Farīd) 73, 363, 380–384 Bidar: Its History and Monuments (Yazdani)
Bībī Qayyūmi/Bībī Ṣāḥiba/Bībī Kalāṅ 159, 253, 276–277
172, 333–339 Bihar, forgotten Sufi women from 497
572 Index

Bihishtī Zewar (Thanāwī) 159, 197 on women 94, 138, 183

Bijapur, forgotten Sufi women from on women of ill repute 143–144
497–498 mention of 62
Bilgrāmī, Ṣaghīr Aḥmad 416 Burhānu’d-Dīn Quṭb-i-ʿĀlam 374
Bishārat-i-Mazahriyyā 329–330 Burton, Richard F. 193–194, 300–301, 306
Blair, Sheila 174 Buzurg (sister of Hāṅsā Bukhārī) 182
Blois, François de 206
Boivin, Michel 20–21 celibacy
bondmaids see slave girls/maidservants in general 104
Bonuvrié, Netty 5–6 of Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr 405
books by Sufi women of Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb 121
Irshādu’l Fuqarāʾ (Bebe Nekbakhta) 63, vs. marriage 91–92, 93, 112, 120
445–447 of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 104, 120
Mʿālūmāt-i-Walīya (Bībī Walīya) 298 Census(Bray) 313
Mūnisu’l-arwāḥ (Jahān Ārāʾ Begum) 63, Chaghtai, M. Abdulla 376
75, 190–191, 448 chakki (grinding stone) ritual 439, 466
Risāla-yi ṣāḥibiyya (Jahān Ārāʾ chakki-namas (songs while grinding) 36
Begum) 63, 448–452 Chand, Tara 32
Bray, Denys 313, 495 Chanda Bī 250–251
Būbū Rāstī 129–130, 418–420 Chandāyān (Mawlānā Daʾūd Awadhi) 36
Buchanan, Francis 213 chaos, women perceived as 88, 90–94
Buehler, Arthur 106, 339 Chatrīwālī Sarkar 489
Bukhari, Afshan 179–180 children
Bukhārī, Jalālu’d-Dīn (Jahāṅiyaṅ death of 131, 132
Jahāṅgasht) 240, 248 of slave girls/maidservants 140
Bulbul Shāh 247, 248 stillborn 267–268
Burgess, James 375–376 Sufi men’s views on 130–134
Burhanpurī, Muḥammad Maṭiʿu’llah Chilla of ʿAlī Datār, Mirāṅ Saiyyid
Rāshid 420 in general 461–462, 463–464, 464–467,
Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb 465, 466, 467
celibacy of 121 female shrines within 467–468
family of healing rituals at 468–470
brother see Muntajibu’d-Dīn Chimnī Bī Ṣāḥiba 433–434
mother 43, 249 Chirāgh-i Dihlī, Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd see
see also Bībī Ḥājara/Mā Ṣāḥiba Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī
sisters 249 Chishtī, ‌ʿAbdu’r Raḥmān 52, 76, 269
interactions/relationships of Chishtī, ‌Ilah 39, 343, 382
with Bībī ʿĀʾisha 228–230 Chishtī, ʿAlī Asghar 76, 101, 219, 231,
with Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 227 342–343, 381, 382–383
with Sōnā Bāʾī 253 Chishtī, Amānat ʿAlī 299
malfūzāt of see Aḥsanu’l aqwāl (Kāshānī) Chishtī al-Munʿamī, Ghulām Ḥusain 301
shrine of 253 Chishtī-Ṣabirī, Bābā Mastān ʿUmru’d-Dīn
spiritual jurisdiction and 147 494
ʿurs celebration of 190 Chishtī-Ṣabirī, Bābā Sirāju’l Ḥaqq Shah 494
views of 183 Chittick, William C. 91, 280
on Bahāʾu’d-Dīn Zakarīyya 93–94 colonial administration 83, 85
on Kāshānī, Ruknu’d-Dīn Dabīr 106 Cornell, Rkia 7, 8, 12–13, 24, 68, 70
on marriage/marital life 118–119 Cunningham, Alexander 85, 208, 212–213
Index 573

Dādī Bakhtūʾī 238–239 of fathers/husbands/sons and

Dādi Mā 462, 466–468 brothers 356–368
Dahlén, Ashk P. 15 initiations of
Dakake, Maria M. 14–15, 22 in general 147–152
Dāmā Mā 462, 466–468 rules of segregation for 153–154
Dārā Shikūh, Muḥammad 74–75, 110, 368, of Jāṅbāz Qalandar Lāharpurī 289
370, 402, 447, 449, 451–452 of Jān-i-Jānāṅ, Mazhar 329, 331
Darāb Khan 130, 420 of Kamāl, Muḥammad 300
darbārs (shrines) see shrines of Khwānd Mīr ʿArīzī 374
Dargāh Qulī Khān, Zu’l-qadr 196 mothers as 110, 361, 367, 374
dargāhs (shrines) see shrines of Muʿīnu’d-Dīn Chishtī 449
Darul Ishāʿat press 247 of Multānī Bādshāh 270–271
Darwish Jamālī Kambo see Jamālī, Ḥāmid b. of Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i
Faẓlu’llah Dihlī 149–152, 377
Dāta Ganj Bakhsh see Hujwīrī, Abu’l Ḥasan ʿAlī of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 405, 406
Daʾūd Awadhi (d. 1322) 36 oaths of alliance of
Daʾūd Khan 366, 445, 447 method of administering 147–
daughters 148, 150–152
in general 108–109 Sirhindī on 129
advice to 81–82, 109 parda rules and 160
of Bībī Ḥājara/Mā Ṣāḥiba 249, 371 of Ṣibghat Allāhī, Allāh 286,
of Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar 231–232, 367–368
362–363 wives as 116–117, 153
of Muḥammad Mīr 289–291 male
of Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī Ajmerī 341–342 of Badakhshī, Mullā Shah 451–452
Daulā Daryai 450 of Bhikārī Chishtī, Shāh 422
Delage, Remy 20 of Dihlawī, ʿAbdu’l-Ḥaqq
Delhi Sultanate 1, 2–3, 33, 392 Muḥaddis 74
see also under specific Sultans/Sultana of Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar 223
Devotional Islam in Contemporary South Asia: initiations of 154–155
Shrines, Journeys and Wanderers (Boivin & of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 35, 405
Delage) 20 divorce 10, 99, 115, 126, 128, 179
dhammal dancing 20 Dosan Miyāṅ 461
Dhikr an-Niswa al-Mutaʿabidāt as-Ṣūfiyyāt Duhat Bībī 254–255, 255–256
(as-Sulamī) 12–13, 68
dialects 31, 35–36 Eastwick, Edward 263
Digby, Simon 126 Elias, Jamal 10–11
Dilshād, Muḥammad 240 Ernst, Carl 147, 227–228, 231
disciples (murīd) Eternal:,,ter (Ernst) 227–228
etiquettes for 56–57, 110, 155 ethnic diversity, in South Asia 31–32
female etiquette (ādāb) see ādāb
of ʿAbdur Raḥīm 157, 294 Eve 91, 92, 99–100
of Badakhshī, Mullā Shah 451–452 Ezzati, Abul Fazal 343, 453
of Badru’d-Dīn ʿĀlam Zāhidī 357
bond with pīr of 154 Fahkhru’d-Dīn, Bābā (d. 1295) 319
of Chatrīwālī Sarkar 489 Fahkhru’d-Dīn Dihlawī (d. 1785) 292
of Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar 223, Fahkhru’d-Dīn ῾Irāqī (d. 1289) 129
225, 364, 407 fakirs, female 21
574 Index

family Farīdu’d-Dīn Masʿūd (Ganj-i-Shakkar) 421

Sufi men’s views on Farsi language 35–36
in general 104–105 Fārūqī, Abū al-Ḥasan Zīd 380
children 130–134 Fārūqī, Burhan‌Ahmad‌
mothers, sisters, daughters 106–112 Faruqui, Munis Daniyal 212
Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i fasts/fasting 322, 410–411
Dihlī 104–105 Fatāwā ʿAzīzī (ʿAbdul ʿAzīz Dihlawī) 137
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 106 Fatḥ ʿAlī Wāʾisī 332
Fānī, Muḥsin 452 Fatḥ Muḥammad, Khalīfa 295–296
al-Fansūrī, Muḥammad Amīr Ḥasan Fatḥu’l-awliyāʾ (anon.) 227
Madārī 268–269 Faṭima (wife of Ahmad b. Khiẓrūya
Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar (Bābā Farīd) al-Balkhi) 70
books of 60 Fatūḥāt al-makkiyyā (Ibn al-ʿArabi) 67
disciples of 223, 225, 407 Fauq, Muḥammad Dīn 247
family/descendants of Fawaʾidu’l-Fuʾād (Ḥasan‌Sijzi Dihlawī)
daughters 231–232, 362–363 in general 56, 58, 70–71, 395
see also Bībī ʿĀʾisha; Bībī Fātima; views of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ in see
Bībī Mastūra; Bībī Sharīfa Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ, views of
father 382 see also Ḥasan‌Sijzi Dihlawī
mother 380, 381 Faẓlu’llah Naqshbandī, Muḥammad 333,
see also Bībī Qarsum Khātūn 334, 337, 339
sisters see Bībī Ḥājara female fakirs 21
wives 100, 118 female singers 19–20
see also Bībī Huzaira Khātūn; Bībī “Female Sufi Saints and Disciples: Women in
Rāstī the Life of Jalāl al-dīn Rūmī” (Dahlén) 15
interactions/relationships of The Female Voice in Sufi Ritual: Devotional
with Bībī Fāṭima Sām 407, 509 Practices of Pakistan and India
with maidservants 139 (Abbas) 19
with mother 382–383 Firdawsī, Ghulām Nabī 356–357
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 58–59, 101 Firūz Shāh Tughlaq (d. 1388) 209, 213
jurisdiction of 146 Firuzpurī, Miyān Jī Muḥammad Ismāʿīl 201
khānqāh of Five Respected Women (Pānch Bībī kī
food distribution at 116 Dargāh) 313
women’s presence in 182, 184 Five Sisters (Pānch Bībioṅ) 44, 249–250
malfūzāt of see Asrāru’l awliyā’ Flueckiger, Joyce Burkhalter 18–19
views of flying, miraculous (marṭab-e‌ṭairī) 250, 269
on Bībī Fāṭima Sām 408, 413 Forman, Mrs. John 53
on children 132–133 free food (langar) 178, 483
on daughter as khalifa 1–2, 11, 109, Frembgen, Jürgen Wasim 20
166–167 Futūḥ-us Salaṭīn (ʿIṣāmī) 2
on Fāṭima Sām 137
on role of pīr 154 Gangā Bībī 261–262
on women 89 Gangohī, Rashīd Aḥmad 200, 344, 346
views on Ganj-i-Shakkar (Farīdu’d-Dīn Masʿūd) 154,
of Amīr Khwurd 131, 223 182, 421
see also Jawāhir-i Farīdī Gazetteer of the Multan district 293
works of, Surruʾs-Ṣudūr 218 Ghāʾib Shah, Ḥāji 85–86
mention of 58
Index 575

Gharīb Nawāz see Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī on slave girls/maidservants 139–140

Ajmeri on spiritual relationships 106
Ghāsī, Qāẓī 280–281 on succession of Naṣīru’d-Dīn
al-Ghazālī 93, 124, 175–176 Chirāgh-i Dihlī 167–168
Ghāzī Bābā (Shamsu’d-Dīn, Khwāja) on wives as disciples 116–117, 153
239–240 on women of ill repute 144
Ghāzī Miyān (Saiyyid Salār Masʿūd Ghāzī) on women’s spirituality 164–165
20, 53 gnosis (maʿrifa) 69
Ghāzīu’d-Dīn Khan 292 Goldziher, Ignaz 50–51
Ghaznavids 33 gonorrhoea 125
Ghiyāspur, khānqāh in 88, 149, 177–178, 181 graves see shrines
Ghulām Aḥmad b. Saiyyid ʿAzīzullah b. Nūr Green, Nile 86
Aḥmad b. Saiyyid Jalāl Bukhari 453 grinding stone (chakki) ritual 439, 466
Ghulām ʿAlī Dihlawī 97, 289–290, 329, “Guest of the Inmost Heart: Conceptions
348–349 of the Divine Beloved among Early Sufi
Ghulām Ḥasan (d. 1789) 334 Women” (Dakake) 14–15
Ghulām Muḥammad (d. 1765) 334 Guldasta-yi karamāt (Lahorī) 483
Ghulām Muʿīnu’d-Dīn ʿAbdullah see Kheshgī, Gulshan-i Awliyāʾ 101
ʿAbdu’llah Gulzār-i Abrār (Māndawī) 74, 404–406, 419,
Ghulām Nabī (d. 1811) 334 422–423
Gīsū Darāz, Muḥammad Ḥusainī Bandā Gūngī Bī 250–251
Nawāz
control of sexual urges by 121–123 Habib, Jaweda 324
education of 111 Habib, Mohammad 60, 88–89
family/descendants of Ḥabīb Allāh Ṣibghat Allāhī (d. 1632) 286,
Bībī Bandagī Ḥusainī 276 314, 367–368
granddaughter of 435 Ḥadīqatu’l Awliyāʾ (ʿAbdulādir) 385, 387
grandson of 435 Ḥadīqatu’l Awliyāʾ (Lahorī) 79, 428
mother of 111 Ḥadīth
Walī Ullāh Ḥusainī 277 on Sufis 49
wife of 117n50 on wives 113
Gulbarga khānqāh of 152 on women 91–92, 98, 99–100, 160
interactions/relationships of, with Ḥāfiz Ghulām Rasūl Gujarati 498
Simnānī 168 Ḥaft ʿAfīfa (Seven Virtuous Ladies) 80,
letters of 164–165 441–444
malfuz of see Jawāmiʿulʾ-kilam hagiographies 52–54
shrine visitations by 225, 326, 411 see also under specific hagiographies
views of Haibat Khan 275
on Bībī Fāṭima Sām 408, 411–412, 413 Ḥājī ʿAbdu’llah 450
on dialects of India 35 Ḥajj pilgrimage
on etiquettes 57 of female singer 142–143
on female disciples 152–153 of Sufi women
on forged malfūzāt 60 ʿAjība Khānam 329–330
on inaudibility of women 199–200 Bībī Fāṭima/Bībī Ḥajiānī 305–306
on marriage/marital life 123 Bībī Ṣāḥiba/Bībī Kalāṅ/Bībī
on Mashāriqu’l Anwār 99 Qayyūmi 337
on shrine of pīr replacing Saiyyida Ḥāfiza Bībī 415
Kʿaba 187–188 Hamadānī, Mīr Muḥammad (d. 1448) 256
576 Index

Hamadānī, Muḥammad Ṣādiq Dihlawi of ʿAlī Datār, Mirāṅ Saiyyid 462,

Kashmiri (17th century) 37, 74, 156 464–465
Ḥāmid b. Faẓlu’llah see Jamālī, Ḥāmid b. of salt 309, 316, 318, 439, 476, 493
Faẓlu’llah of Sufi women
Ḥāmid Ḥasan Chishtī 405 Amma Bī/Maḥmūdā Bībī 493
Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Ḍarīr 111 from Balochistan 496
Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī 107, 218–220, 221, Bībī Kamāl/Kamālo 213
222, 342 Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh/Sayyida Junaid Bībī/
Ḥammād, Shaikh 308–309 Mirāṅ Pīr 482–486
hands, touching of women’s 102, 148, 151 Makhkhan Bī 417–418
Hāṅsā Bukhārī (d. 1596/1597) 182 Saiyyida Khadīja Bībī 474
Ḥaqaʾiq-i Hindi (ʿAbdul Wahid Bilgrāmī) 36 of water at shrines 378, 391, 474, 491
Ḥaqīqat-i Gulzār-i Ṣābirī (Ṣābirī Chishtī see also miracles/miraculous powers
Rampurī) 53–54, 116, 453 Hidāyat ʿAlī, Muḥammad 159–161
Ḥaqq, ʿAlaʾu’l b. Asʿadi Lahori Bangali see Ḥilyātu’l awliyāʾ wa ṭabaqātu’l aṣfiyyāʾ (Abu
Ḥaqq, Nūru’l Nuʿaym al-Iṣfahānī) 65
Ḥaqq, Nūru’l 134–135 hina paste 487–488
Harāwī, Niʿmatu’llah 78, 217, 275–276, Hindawi language 35–36
320–321, 432 Hoffman-Ladd, Valerie 7, 8, 21–22, 67, 93
Hāro Ana 306–308 Hotak, Muḥammad 366, 445
Harro Bībī 262–266 Hujwīrī, Abu’l Ḥasan ʿAlī
Hārwanī, ʿUsmān 61, 112–114 life of 39–41
Ḥasan Shāh 42 shrine visitations by 195, 437
Ḥasan‌Sijzi Dihlawī views of
compassion of 141 on Sufism/taṣawwuf 47–49
credibility of 23 on women
as scribe of Fawaʾidu’l-Fuʾād 56, 58, 71, in general 69–70, 88, 90–92
395 wives 112
see also Fawaʾidu’l-fuʾād works of, Kashfu’l Maḥjūb 39, 47–48,
al-Hasani, Syed Abdul Hayy Nadwi 222, 414 68–70, 88, 90–91, 112
hashim 175 human temperaments (mizāj) xii
Hāshim ʿAlāwī (Hāshim Pīr) 282–283, 284 Ḥusain b. ʿAlī 437
Hāshim Kishmī, Muḥammad 340–341, 379, Ḥusain Gharīb Dhukarposh, 210
380 Ḥusain Shāh Bukhārī 315
Hāshim Pīr (Hāshim ʿAlāwī) 282–283, 284 Ḥusainī, ʿAbdurʾ Raḥman 287
Hashmi, Farhat Naseem 4–5 Ḥusainī, ʿAlī Muḥammad 287–288
Hasht Bihisht (Amīr Khusraw) 81–82, 109 Ḥusainī, Muḥammad Akbar 140, 412
Ḥassāmu’d-Dīn, Makhdūm Shāh 210, 211 Ḥusainī, Muḥammad Kamgār Khan 183
Hasti Bībī 84, 266–267 Ḥusāmu’d-Dīn Aḥmad 341
Ḥayāt, Muḥammad 300
Ḥaẓarātu’l-quds (Sirhindī) 380 Ibn al-ʿArabī 9, 10, 67, 146, 324
Hazbaru’d-Dīn Zafar Khan 43 Ibn Baṭuṭa 3, 38n26
Ḥaẓrat Bābājān 426–427 Ibn Isḥāq 148
Ḥaẓrat Naʿīma 367–368 Ibn al-Jawzī 175
Haẓrat Shah ʿAbdu’l Mannān Ḥuẓūrī Ibn Taymiīyah 175, 177, 195
al-ma῾ārūʿf Burqa῾-posh 490–491, 491 Ibrāḥīm b. Adham 93
Ḥaẓrat Zachchā Bībī 325–326 iḥtilām (nocturnal emission of seminal
healing powers fluid) 93–94
in general 18–19 Ikhtiyāru’d-Dīn Khaljī 209
Index 577

Ilāhi‌nāmā (Aṭṭār) 206 Islamic law (sharīʿā) 275

ʿIlmuʾud-Dīn, Saiyyid 461 Ismāʿīl Shahīd, Muḥammad 197
Iltutmish, Sultan of Delhi 3, 364–365, 392
Ilyās, Muḥammad 201 Jahān Ārāʾ Begam 447–453
Imāmu’d-Dīn Ghoryāl 445 Begam Dālān build by 343
impotency 282 shrine of 27
income of shrines (nazrānā) xii, xix, 85, visit to shrine of Muʿīnu’d-Dīn
441, 460, 467, 475, 477, 489, 493 Chishtī 190–191
India works of
languages of 35–36 in general 368
in Muslim traditions 35–37 Mūnisu’l arwāh 63, 75, 190–191, 342,
Partition of 303, 461–462 448
infertility, healing of 254, 391, 476, 482–483 Risāla-yi ṣāḥibiyya 63, 75, 448–452
initiations (baiʿat) zenana build by 179
of men, Suhrawardī on 154–155 Jahangir, Mughal Emperor 35, 72, 74, 76, 78,
of women 107, 217, 278–279, 343, 379, 404, 447
in general 147–152 Jahāṅiyaṅ Jahāṅgasht (Bukhārī, Jalālu’d-Dīn)
Aḥmad Gangohī and 157–159 240, 248
Aḥmad Raza Khan Fāzil Barelwī Jaipurī, Muḥammad Ḥidāyat ʿAlī see Hidāyat
on 161–162 ʿAlī, Muḥammad
different practices for 154, 155–157 Jalālu’d-Dīn Thānesrī 454
Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī on 155–156 jamāʿat khānas (house of congregation) see
Naqshbandī-Mujaddidī stance Sufi lodges
on 160–161 Jamāʿat-i Islāmī (political party) 4
by proxy 159 Jamāl Baghdādī Wārangalī 434–435
rules of segregation for 153–154 Jamālī, Ḥāmid b. Faẓlu’llah 60, 72, 181, 182,
Thanāwī on 159 221, 235, 385, 395
Walīullah Dihlawī on 157 Jamālu’d-Dīn, Sulṭān of Farghana 42, 385
see also disciples Jamālu’d-Dīn Hāṅswī 139, 249
insān-i kāmil (Perfect Person) 9 Jāmī,‌ʿAbdur Raḥmān 60, 67–68, 98, 205,
invisibility of women see veiling of women 206, 207, 339n54, 449
Irshādu’l Fuqarāʾ (Bebe Nekbakhta) 63, Jāṅbāz Qalandar Lāharpurī, ʿAbdur
445–447 Raḥmān 289
ʿĪsā Jundu’llah, Masīhu’l Awliyāʾ Jān-i-Jānāṅ, Mazhar 119, 156–157, 171, 195,
(d. 1622) 155, 419–420 289–290, 327–331, 347, 348
ʿIṣāmī, Imadu’d-Din Maḥmūd 2 Jawad, Haifa 7–8
Isḥāq, Badru’d-Dīn 60–61, 223–224, 363, 393 Jawāhir-i Farīdī (Chishtī) 76, 101, 139, 219,
Islam 231, 342–343, 381, 382–383
feminine dimension of 9–10 Jawāmiʿulʾ-kilam (Ḥusainī) 140, 412
in South Asia Jījā Mīrāṅ/Māʾī Qadam 314
arrival of 32–33 Jīwan Amethwī, Aḥmad 401, 403
converts and 34 Jiyya/Bībī Ḥabībā 210
Muslim communities in ix, 31–32, Jundhi Patni 442
34, 112 Jūsī/Yūsuf, Shaikh (d. 1146) 421
Western divisions of 9
women in see Sufi women; women Kakar, Bustān 275
Islamic jurisprudence ( fiqh) 275 Kakbūr Sarwānī, Aḥmad 216–217
578 Index

Kākwī, Ghafūru’r Raḥman 208 Khāliq bāri (attr. Amīr Khusraw) 36

al-Kalābādhi, Abū Bakr 69–70 Khan, ʿAlī Muḥammad (d. 1889) 278,
Kalimātuʾs-ṣādiqīn (Hamadani) 37, 74, 156 372–374, 375, 376, 461
Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī, Shāh (d. 1729) Khan, Ḥāmid‌ʿAlī (d. 1887) 117
16, 83, 125, 130, 140, 155–156, 182–183 Khan Sarwānī, ʿUmar 344
Kamālu’d-Dīn Awadhi 236, 238 Khānam Jī 292
Kāmil, Miāṅ Muḥammad (d. 1823) 26, 299, Khānam Ṣāḥib 429–430
300 khānqāhs see Sufi lodges
Kamptee/Kamthi 423–424 Khatri, Ṣiddique ʿAbdu’llah 477–478
kanīz/kanīzak see slave girls/maidservants Khattu, Aḥmad 101–102
Kanzu’l ʿUmmāl (al-Muṭṭaqī al-Hindī) Khazīnatu’l Aṣfiyyāʾ (Lahorī) 78, 216
169–170 Kheshgī, ʿAbdu’llah
Kanzu᾽l-Ansāb (ʿAṭāʾ Ḥussain) 208, 382 date of birth of 285
karāmat (spiritual charisma) see spiritual views of
charisma on Bībī Bebe 354–356
Karamustafa, Ahmet T. 175–176, 179 on Bībī Durrā Quṣūrī 277–278
Kāshānī, Ḥammād 93, 121, 138, 183 on Bībī Duyā 217
Kāshānī, Ruknu’d-Dīn Dabīr 61, 106 on Bībī Fāṭima Sām 410
Kashfu’l Maḥjūb (al-Hujwīrī) 39, 47–48, on Bībī Mahkalī 267–268, 509–510
68–70, 88, 90–91, 112 on Bībī Mammi 281–282
Kasmani, Omar 21 on Bībī Rāstī/ Pāk Mā’ī/Pāk
Katbar, Bachchā 300 Dāmnāṅ 387, 389
Kausar, Bābā 456–457 on Bībī Sāra 393
Kausar, Inʿām-ul-Ḥaq 312, 435, 495 on Bībī Shaikhī Durkhānī 319
Kazārūnī, Abu Isḥāq 38 on Bībī Shaikhī Fāṭima 284–285
Kazārūnī, Ṣafīu’d-Dīn 38–39 on Bībī Shaikhzādī 320–321
Khadīja Bībī 422–423 on Būbū Rāstī 418
Khairu’l Majālis (Qalandar) 71, 94–95, 132, works of
133, 137, 149–150, 235–236, 410–411 Akbāru’l awliyāʾ min lisānu’l
khalifas aṣfiyāʾ 76–77, 267–268, 277,
Sufi women as 277–278, 281–282, 284–285, 319, 320,
in general 165–172 354–355, 354–356, 509–510
ʿAjība Khānam 171, 327, 329, 331 Maʿāriju’l wilāyat 18, 36, 77–78, 216,
Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl 166, 342 267–268, 278, 282, 387, 389, 393,
Bībī Islām Khāno 344–345 410–411, 418
Bībī Ṣāḥiba/Bībī Kalāṅ/Bībī mention of 286
Qayyūmi 172, 333, 335–336 Khudā Bakhsh 288
disqualification of Khuihāmi, Ghulām Ḥasan 249, 254–256,
in general 166–171 261, 350, 351–352
Bībī Sharīfa 1–2, 11, 109, 166–167, Khujasta Akhtar/Bībī Abdāl 356–358
364–365 Khusḥāl Khan Khattak 365
at Ḥaft ʿAfīfa shrine 444 al-Khuttalī, Abu’l Fazl Muḥammad 40
Mardum Maḥall 171, 348 Khuzdār/Quzdār 206–207
Shāmma Bībī 349–351 Khwāja Muḥammad Parsā 339
successor of Naṣīru’d-Dīn Chirāgh-i Khwān Bībī Ṣāḥiba 244–245
Dihlī 167–168 Khwānd Mīr ʿArīzī 373–374
of Sufi women, male 353 Khwānd Mīr Junaidī 433–434
see also shaikhas Khwashtarā Bībī 278–279
Index 579

Kirmānī, Aḥmad 222–223 lineage (shajara) 105–106, 298, 368, 386, 389
Kirmānī, Mubārak Muḥammad 231 Little, David 179
al-Kirmānī, Muḥammad b. Mubārak al-ʿAlawī Lodi Sultanate 275n256
see Amīr Khwurd Lubābu’l-Albāb (ʿAwfī) 205, 207
Kirmānī, Muḥammad Maḥmūd (grandfather Lynes, Krista Geneviève 207
of Amīr Khwurd) 222–223
Kitāb ādābu’l-murīdīn (Suhrāwardī, Abū Mā Ṣāḥiba Ashraf-i do-jahāṇ see Bībī Ashraf
Najīb ) 57, 120, 322 Jahāṅ Ḥaẓrat Mā Ṣāḥiba
Kitāb tazkiratu’l-khwātīn dar sharaḥ-i ḥāl- i Mā Ṣāḥiba/Bībī Ḥājara see Bībī Ḥājara/Mā
mashāhīr-i niswān-i ʿālam az ʿArab wa Ṣāḥiba
Rūm wa Hind wa ʿAjam az ṣadr-i Islām Maʿāriju’l-Wilāyat (Kheshgī) see Kheshgī,
(Shirazi) 79–80 ʿAbdu’llah
Kitāb-al-lumaʿ fi’l-tasṣawwuf Maʿāsiru’l‌Kirām (Āzād Bilgrāmī) 291n327,
(al-Sarrāj) 49–50 415
Küçük, Hülya 11 Maclean, Derry L. 311
Kulliyāt-i‌Ṣāleh (Safūri) 293 Madni, Saiyyid 319
Māh Khātūn/Bībī Khwānd Mā Ṣ̣āḥiba
Lahore 245–246
al-Hujwīrī’s stay in 40–41 Māhīn Abu’l Bakr Awliyāʾ Allāh 41, 304, 305
Māʿī Bhāgī in 428–429 Mahmand b. Daulatyār 217
Lahorī, Ghulām Sarwar 38, 41, 78–79, 248, Maḥmūd Hāṅswī 249, 371
262, 263, 394, 428, 437, 438, 483 Maḥmūdā Bībī/Amma Bī 492–493, 492
Lahorī, Nūr Aḥmad Chishtī 258, 438 Māʾi Baréchāni/Māʾi Gondrani 495
Lahori, Salār 435 Māʿī Bhāgī 428–429
Lal, Mohan 240–241 Māʾī Fāṭima Mastūiʾn 435
Lallā ʿArifā/Lāl Ded/Lallā Yogishwari Māʾī Gāŕhī 28, 474–476
247–249 Māʾi Gondrani/Māʾi Baréchāni 495
Lamaʿat (Fahkhru’d-Dīn ῾Irāqī) 129 Māʾī Khadīja 26, 299–300
langar (free food) 116, 138, 178, 183, 444, 475, Māʾi Khairū 495, 496
483, 488 Māʾī Lānjī 42, 476–477, 477
Langar Mall, Bābā 261–262 Māʾī Maklī 84, 308–309
Langar Zamīn, Sulaimān 210 Māʾī Meharbān 493–494
language command, of Sufi women 298, Māʾī Mihirbān 214–215
332 Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh/Sayyida Junaid Bībī/Mirāṅ
Laṭāʾif-i Quddūsī (Ruknu’d-Dīn) 344–345 Pīr 477–488
Lees, William Nassau 45–46 healing powers of 482–486
letters legends about 42, 480–482
of authorisation for instructions 171, shrine of
331, 335 in general 86–87, 476–480
of Gīsū Darāz 164–165 āsitāna within 317
of Jān-i-Jānāṅ, Mazhar 329–331, 348, 349 management of 487–488
of Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī 156 as space for women
of Manerī, Sharfu’d-Dīn Yāhyā 124, 188 bonding 486–487
of Quddūs Gangohī, ʿAbdu’l 170–171, 344 visitations of 193
of Sirhindī, Aḥmad 128–129 sister of Māʾī Lānjī 42, 477
Lidā Mall Rishī 261–262 ʿurs celebrations for 86, 478, 486
“A Lightning Trigger or a Stumbling Block: Māʾi Natrū 495, 496
Mother Images and Roles in Classical Māʾī Nihāl Khātūn 300
Sufism” (Salamah-Qudsi) 15–16 Māʾī Nūruʾn nisāʾ Begam 301–304, 510
580 Index

Māʾī Qadam/Jījā Mīrāṅ 314 Mardum Maḥall/Bībī Ḥayātuʾn-nisāʾ 171,

Māʾi Saidū 495, 496 327–328, 347–349
Māʾī Sapūraṅ/Ṣafūrā Qādirīyyā 292–293 maʿrifa (gnosis) 69, 212
maidservants see slave girls/maidservants marriage/marital life
Majīd, Muḥammad ʿAbdu’l 371 in general 104
Majzūba of Muḥammadpur 425–426 vs. celibacy 91–92, 93, 112, 120
Makhdūma Jahān 376 sex and 120–126
Makhdūm-i Jahān see Manerī, Sharfu’d-Dīn views of Sufi men on 112–120, 123
Yāhyā marṭab-e‌ṭairī (flying, miraculous) 251
Makhkhan Bī 417–418 Mʿarūf, Shaikh of Jaunpur 402
Maklī, necropolis of 84, 308–309, 315 Marwandi, Usman (Qalandar Lal
Maktubāt-i Rabbānī (Sirhindī) 127 Shahbaz) 20, 21
male singers 19 Mashāriqu’l Anwār (Ṣaghānī) 97, 99–100
malfūzāt/malfūz 55–59 Mʿāshūq Rabbānī 434–435
in general 70–71 Masson, Charles 310–311
about or by women 63 Maṭlaʿ ʿul-anwār (Amīr Khusraw) 81
accuracy of 58–59 Maudūdi, Abul ʿAlā 4
forged 60–62 Mauj Daryā Bukhārī 257
oral traditions and 25–26, 55–56, 83 al-Mawṣilī, Fatḥ 130
Malhī Qattāl 217 mazārs (shrines) see shrines
Malik Khushbāsh 374 McConaghey, Allen 495, 496
Malik Shʿabān 374 meals, cooking of 17, 93–94, 161, 183, 379
Maliki school 12 Meeruthī, Muḥammad‌ʿĀshiq Ilāhī 158
Mʿālūmāt-i-Walīya (Bībī Walīya) 298 Mehmed Zihni Effendi 80
management menstruation 150n17, 161, 317
of shrines 83, 182, 444, 475, 476, 487–488 Mernissi, Fatima 16
of Sufi lodges 174 Miāṅ Jī Chishtī 423
Manāqibu’l Aṣfiyya (Shuʿaib Firdawsī) 133 Miāṅ Mastān Shāh xii
Manāqibu’l Awliyāʾ (Jīwan Amethwī) 401 Miāṅ Mīr (Miyāṅ Jīv) 74–75
Manāqibu’l Maḥbūbīn (Sulaimānī) 342 Mihr Bakhsh 302
Māndawī, Muḥammad Ghawsī Shaṭṭārī 72, Miller, Ronald E. 304
74, 404–406, 419, 422–423 Min Allāh Shāh 435
Manerī, Aḥmad Yāhyā 210 Minhāj Sirāj Juzjāni 1, 33, 365
Manerī, Sharfu’d-Dīn Yāhyā Minnat-Ullah Bībī Ṣāḥiba 180, 436
letters of 124, 188 Minorsky, Vladimir F. 206–207
mother of see Bībī Raẓiya Mīr Khwurd see Amīr Khwurd
shrine of 212 Mīrā Bībī 256–257
views of miracles/miraculous powers
on children 133–134 associated with
on Malfūzāt of Hārwanī 114 ʿAbbās ʿAlī/ʿAbbās Makkī/Gorā Chānd
on sex/sexual urges 123–124 Shāh 251–252
on visits to shrines 188 ʿAbdul Qādir Gilāni 483
mention of 357 Bī Amma Ṣāḥiba 425
Mangho Pīr 193–194 Bībī Abdāl/Khujasta Akhtar 357–358
Maqāmāt-i‌Mazhari (Ghulām ʿAlī) Bībī Ajjī Ṣāḥiba 288
289–290, 329, 348–349 Bībī Durrā Quṣūrī 277
Maqṣūd‌al-murād 282–283 Bībī Duyā 217
Index 581

Bībī Fāṭima Saiyyida Gilānī 258 Mirāt-ul Asrār (Chishtī) 76

Bībī Fāṭima Sām 412–413 Mirātu’l Kaunain (Firdawsī) 356–357
Bībī Fāṭima/Bībī Ḥajiānī 306 Mīr-i Kalān 107
Bībī Ḥājara/Mā Ṣāḥiba 371–372 Mirza, Mohammad Wahid 107
Bībī Khunza [Khunjā] Sulṭāna 378 Miyān Akhund Saʿīd Shuryānī (d. 1609) 267,
Bībī Khwurd 416 268, 509–510
Bībī Makhdūma 403 Miyāṅ Mīr/Miyāṅ Jīv (d. 1635) 74–75, 110,
Bībī Nūrbharī 431 368, 369, 370
Bībī Qarsum Khātūn 383–384 Miyāṅ Qāsim Afghānī Qādirī 445
Bībī Rāstī 432–433 Miʿyār-us sulūk (Hidāyat ʿAlī) 159–161
Bībī Ṣāḥiba/Bībī Kalāṅ/Bībī mizāj (human temperaments) xii
Qayyūmi 337–338, 339 al-Mīzān al-kubrā al-Shaʿrānīyah
Bībī Sāra 392–393 (al-Shaʿranī) 161–162
Bībī Shaikhī Durkhānī 320 mobility of women xi–xii, 161, 196, 197, 201
Bībī Sharīfa (daughter of Muḥammad see also Ḥajj pilgrimage; travels
Fāzil) 294, 295–296 Mohan Lal, Munshi 84, 241–242
Bībī Zulaikhā 398–399 Mojaddedi, Javid A. 67
Hāro Ana 307–308 Moroccan Female Religious (Ouguir) 12
Ḥaẓrat Bābājān 426 Morocco 12
Haẓrat Shah ʿAbdu’l Mannān mosques 179–180, 262, 266, 375–376
Ḥuẓūrī 490 mothers/motherhood
Lidā Mall Rishī 261 in general 108, 109–110
Māʾī Khadīja 300 as disciples of sons 110, 361, 367, 374
Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh/Sayyida Junaid Bībī/ motichoor laddūs (ball-shaped
Mirāṅ Pīr 482–486 sweetmeat) 439, 440
Māʾī Sapūraṅ/Ṣafūrā Muʿāmilāt-i Mazhariyya (Naʿīmu’llah
Qādirīyyā 292–293 Bahrāʾīchī) 102–103, 348
Majzūba of Muḥammadpur 425 Muḥammad, Prophet 95–96
Makhkhan Bī 418 Muḥammad Abu’l Qāsīm Gurgānī
Mʿāshūq Rabbānī 434 (d. 1751/1752) 54
Qadam, Māʾī/Jījā Mīrāṅ 314 Muḥammad b. Mubārak al-ʿAlawī al-Kirmānī
Sangha Bībī 353 see Amīr Khwurd
Sittī Mā Ṣaḥiba 286 Muḥammad b. Qāsim 33
see also healing powers Muḥammad b. Tughlaq, Sultan of Delhi 177,
Mīrāṅ Ḥusainī (Shams ul-ʿUshshāq) 377 215, 218
Mirāṅ Pīr see Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh/Sayyida Muḥammad Bāṣīr (d. 1613) 283
Junaid Bībī/Mirāṅ Pīr Muḥammad Chishtī 278, 279n270
Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār Muḥammad Fāẓil 157, 294
shrine of 463–464, 465, 466, 467 Muḥammad Ḥusain (husband of Bānu Zuhrā
chilla 461–467 Khatūn) 333
female shrines within 467–468 Muḥammad Ismāʿīl Bukhārī 38
healing rituals at 468–470 Muḥammad Jamālu’d-Dīn 269
Miran Shāh (Aḥmad Bādpā) 268–270 Muḥammad Makhdūm Bakhsh
Mirāt-i
‌ Madārī (Chishtī) 269 Firdawsī 208
Mirāt-i Masʿūdī (Chishtī) 52 Muḥammad Mīr 289
Mirāt-i‌Aḥmadī (Khan) 278, 372–374, 375, Muḥammad Shāh Āyatullah (Shorish)
461 297
582 Index

Muḥammad Sulṭān 225, 233, 234, 326, 377, Mūsā (husband of Bībī Mammi) 282
433–434 Muslim communities (South Asia) ix,
Muḥammad Wāʾiẓī,‌ʿAbdu’l‌ʿAzīz b. Sher 31–32, 34, 112
Malik 122, 152 al-Muṭṭaqī al-Hindī, ʿAlāʾu’d Dīn ʿAlī b.
Muḥammad Wāris 362 ʿAbdu’l-Malik Ḥusāmu’d-Dīn (d. 1567)
Muḥammad Ẓiāʾu’l Ḥaqq 335, 339 114–115, 168–170
Muḥammadi Begam 247 Muzaffar Shams Balkhī 124
Muḥibu’llah Allāhābādī 280 Mystical Dimensions of Islam (Schimmel)
Muhiʾu’d-Dīn, Shaikh (son of Qāẓī 73–74
Ghāsī) 281 mystical sayings, of Shāmma Bībī 350–351
Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī Ajmerī (d. 1236)
daughter of 109, 166, 341–342 Nādān Bībī/Saidānī Bībī 314–315
disciples of 218–219, 449 Nadwī, Muḥammad Akram 14
shrine of 190–191, 448 Nadwī, Sayyid Sulaiman 14, 32, 37
works attributed to, Anīsu’l Arwāh Nafaḥātu’l-uns min ḥaẓarātu’l-quds
112–113, 114 (Jāmī) 67, 206, 339n54, 449
mention of 39, 41, 131 Nafā’isu᾽l-anfās (Kāshānī) 106
Muir, William 199 Nagore Andawar 188, 274
Mujaddid Alf-i Sānī see Sirhindī, Aḥmad Nāgpurī, Bābā Tāju’d-Dīn 424
Mujaddidī, Muḥammad Hāshim 333–334 Naharwālā, Ḥusain 107, 405–406
Mujaddid-i Alf-i Sānī 334, 336, 379 Naʿīmī, Muḥammad Iqbāl Ḥusain 477
Mujāhadātu’l‌Awliyāʾ (Qalandar) 288 Naʿīmu’llah Bahrāʾīchī, Muḥammad
Mujeeb, Muhammad xiii, 15 102–103, 329–330, 347, 348
Mujībuʾn-nisāʾ 453–455 Nainar, Syed Muhammad Husayn 33
Mukhaddarāt Abdāliyā (Three Chaste Veiled Najību’d-Dīn Mutāwakkil 118, 363, 380, 381,
Women Abdāl) 309–310 384, 407, 408, 409, 411, 413
Mukhtiyār Bībī 493 Naqīʾud-Dīn Awadhī 134, 142
Mukkā Bī 85, 270–271 Naṣībā Bībī 269
Mulkapurī, Muḥammad‌ʿAbdu’lār Khan 182, Naṣiḥat farzand-i bihishtī samaratu’l fu’ād
184, 232–233, 376, 417, 421, 434 ʿafīfā (Amīr Khusraw) 109
Multāni, Hissāmu᾽d-Dīn 164 Nasīm, Waḥīda 232, 252
Multānī Bādshāh 261, 270–271 Nāṣir-ud-dīn (son of Sulṭān Iltutmish) 3
muʾmināt 355 Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i Dihlī
Mumtāz Mahal 63, 447 control of sexual urges by 120–121
Mūnisu’l-arwāḥ (Jahān Ārāʾ Begam) 63, 75, family of 105, 236
190–191, 342, 448 female disciples of 149–152, 377
Munsif, Abdul Ghani 424 interactions/relationships of, Bībī Būbū
Muntajibu’d-Dīn 43, 230, 249, 371, 372, 509 Abādī 236–237
Muntakhabuʾt tawārīkh (Abdu’l Qādir malfūz of see Khairu’l Majālis (Qalandar)
Badaoni) 107, 402n293 succession of 167–168
Muraqqāʿ-yi Dehli (Dargāh Qulī Khān) 196 views of
Murata, Sachiko 10 on Anīsu’l Arwāh 114
murshid (spiritual guides), Sufi women as on Bībī Fāṭima Sām 410–411, 413
16, 120, 155, 161–163, 175, 195, 200, on Bībī Zulaikhā 397
285–286, 335, 343, 381, 400–404, 449 on family 104–105
Murtaʿīsh, Abu Muḥammad 49 on initiations 155
Murtazā, Muḥammad 295 on khānqāhs 177
Mūsā Āhangar Suhrawardī 262–263, 265 on Mashāriqu’l Anwār 99
Index 583

on mother of Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Ḍarīr 111 malfūz of see Fawaʾidu’l-fuʾād; Siyaru’l

ʿurs celebrations 189–190 Awliyāʾ
on women 94–97, 118 as malfūz scribe 58–59
on women’s spirituality 163–164 shrine of 27
views on, of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 57 ʿurs celebration by 190
Nasr, Seyyed Hossein 9–10 views of
Nāz Bībī (daughter of Shaikh Sirāju’d-Dīn on baraka of saints 18
Junaidī) 246 on Bībī Fāṭima Sām 408–409, 413
Nāzir, Ghulām ʿAbdu’l-Qādir 323, 325, 415, on Bībī Qarsum Khātūn 381, 383,
507 384
nazrānā (income of shrines) 38n26, 85, 86, on Bībī Rānī 225
441, 460, 467, 475, 477, 489, 493 on Bībī Sāra 26, 392
Neville, H.R. 239 on celebacy 98–99
Newell, James Richard 426–427 on Chishtī Shaikhs 61
Nijātu’llah, Saiyyid (Shāh Miyāṅ) 291n327 on death of Sufi saints 186
Nizam Bīwī see Beemā Bīwī on effect of supplications 186
Nizāmi, Ḥasan Sānī 394–395 on etiquettes 57
Nizami, Khaliq Ahmad 58, 88, 156, 176–177, on family 106
181, 236, 380 on Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar 131
Nizāmi Dihlavī, Ḥasan 201, 343, 407, on forged malfūzāt 60
412–414 on Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī 222
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Abu’l Muaʾiyyad 26, 41, 199, on Quṭbu’d-Dīn Bakhtiyār Kākī 131
391, 392–393, 394–395 on shrine of pīr replacing Kʿaba 187
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Ambethwī, Bandagī Miaṅ on shrines 185–186
120, 400–401, 402–403, 404 on spiritual jurisdiction 24, 146–147
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Aurangābādī 125, 130, 141, on Sufis 51
156, 183 on traits of men of Allāh 51
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ on walāyat and wilāyat 24
birth of 396 on women 88–89, 98–99, 100–101,
celibacy of 104, 120 109, 408–409
disciples of 35, 405, 406 on women of ill repute 142–143
family/descendants of on women’s initiation 149
mother see Bībī Zulaikha views on, of Amīr Khwurd 100–101
interactions/relationships of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Yamanī 168
with Amīr Khusraw 2, 80, 82 Nizāmu’l Mulk Ṭūsī 92
with Bībī Fāṭima Sām 23–24, 407, novices, female 151
509 Nuh siphir (Amīr Khusraw) 35
with Bībī Rānī 224 Nund Rishī (Nūru’d-Dīn Wali) 254–256, 350
with Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb 227 Nūr Bāʾī 300–301
with children of Badru’d-Dīn Nūr Muḥammad 293
Isḥāq 362 Nūrī Bābā 85–86
with Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Nūru’d-Dīn, Shaikh (d. 1439) 248
Shakkar 58–59, 101 Nūru’d-Dīn Mubārak Ghaznawī (d. 1234) 41,
with mother 395, 398–400 392
khānqāh of Nūru’d-Dīn Wali (Nund Rishī) 254–256, 350
in Ghiyaspur 149, 177–178, 181 Nūru’llah, Shaikh 423
women’s presence in 181 Nuṣrat Jang, Zu’lfiqār Khan Bahadur 324
584 Index

oaths of allegiance (baiʿāt) Rābiʿa Balkhi 205, 207

women and Shāmma Bībī 351
method of administering 147–148, polygamy 128
150–152 possessed women 464–465, 468–469
Sirhindī on 129 postpartum period 325
Walīullah Dihlawī on 157 proselytizing activities 305
oral traditions protection amulets (tʿāwīz) xii
hagiography and 53 Punch Bībīāṅ Ṣaḥiba (Five Respected
malfūzāt/malfūz and 25–26, 55–56, 83 Women) 250–251
shrines and 83, 86–87 Pune/Poona 426
tazkirāt/tazkira and 83
women’s biographies and 238, 293, 311, Qabūlā Ḥusainī (Yad Ullāh Shāh) 435
314, 325, 430, 456–494 Qadam, Shaikh 445
Orientalism 45–46 Qādir, ʿAbdu’l (father of Makhkhan Bī) 417
Ouguir, Aziza 12 Qādirī, Abu’l-Fatḥ Dāw᾽ūd 293
Qadirī, Ḥasan/Pīr Ghāʾib Ṣāḥib 324
Pākdāman Bībīāṅ 494 Qādirī al-Munʿamī, Aḥmad 301
Panah Bībī 302 Qalandar, Ḥāmid 59, 71, 94–95, 133, 137,
Pānch Bībī kī Dargāh (Five Respected 149–150, 235–236, 410–411
Women) 313 Qalandar, Masʿūd ʿAlī 288, 289
Pānch Bībioṅ (Five Sisters) 44, 249–250 Qalandar, Muḥammad Māh 110, 359–361
Pand nāma (ʿAṭṭār) 117 Qalandar, Ᾱrif Billah Shāh Muḥammad
Pānīpatī, Sanāʾu’llah 119, 328, 347, 348, 349 Kāzim 288n313
parda see veiling of women Qalandar Allahabadī, Bāsiṭ ʿAlī 110, 288,
Parda: sharaʿī aur ijtimāʿī nuqta ye nigāh se 289, 361
(Maudūdi) 4 Qalandar Kākorwī, Turāb ‌ʿAlī 196, 288, 289,
Parioṅ, Shāh 485 359, 360, 361
Partition (1947) 461–462 Qalandar Lahirpur, Mujtabā/Majjā 359
Pata Khazana (Hotak) 366, 445 Qalandar Lal Shahbaz (Marwandi, Usman)
Pemberton, Kelly 18 (d. 1274) 20, 21
Perfect Person (insān-i kāmil) 9 Qannaujī, Ṣiddīq Ḥasan Khan xi–xii
Pfleiderer, Beatrix 462 Qāẓī Qāẓan 368–369
Phūl Bībī 110, 289, 359–362 Qāẓī Sāiʾṅ Dittā b. Qāẓī Qalandar Farūqī
Pigot, George 324 369
Pilgrims of Love. The Anthropology of a Global Qāzi Sharfu’d-Dīn 100–101
Sufi Cult (Werbner) 17–18 Qāzī Shuʿaib 382
Pīr ʿAlī 119, 347 al-Qirmisini Muzaffar 66
Pīr Badr see Badru’d-Dīn ʿĀlam Zāhidī Qiwām, Muḥammad Jamāl 396–397
Pīr Ghāʾib Ṣāḥib/Qadirī, Ḥasan 324 Qiwāmu’l-ʿaqā’id (Qiwām) 396–397
Pīr Ghāyab Shāh 458 Quddūs Gangohī, ʿAbdu’l 36, 158, 170–171,
Pīr Saiyyid Walī Muḥammad 492, 492 344
Pīr‌Jug(Shihābu’d-Dīn) 209–210 Quddūsi, ʿIjāzu’l Ḥaqq 344
poetry/poets quilting 292
Sufi men, Amīr Khusraw 35 Quraish Bībī 283
Sufi women Qurʾān
Bebe Nekbakhta 445–447 creation story in 91
Bībī Ḥalīma 366 reciting/memorising of
Māʾī Nūruʾn nisāʾ Begam 303 by Bāʾī Jī 428
Index 585

by Bānu Zuhrā Khatūn 333 Rām, Hittū 311–312

by Bībī Fāṭima/ Bībī Ḥajiānī 306 Ramakrishnan, K.K. 426
by Bībī Rāstī 387 Rashdi, Ḥusamuddīn 316
by Bībī Ṣūrat 275 Rāstī Mā 462, 466–468
by Māʾī Nūruʾn nisāʾ Begam 302 Rasūlnumā Banarsi 297–298
by Makhkhan Bī 417 Rawẓat’l-aqṭāb al-maʿarūf‌bai‌Āṣaf (ʿAlī,
by Saiyyida Ḥāfiza Bībī 415 Rawnaq) 227–230
surah Rawẓatu’l Abrār (Amīn) 352
2:109 xiii Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ (Ᾱzād Bilgramī) 371
2:288 10–11 Rawẓatu’l awliyāʾ-Bijāpur (Zubairī) 79, 250,
3:37 163 273, 282–283, 284, 285, 287–288, 314,
4:23 102 367
4:34 xi Rāzī, Maulānā Fahkhru’d-Dīn 96–97
12:53 98 Raẓiu’d-dīn (alias ʿAbdullah) 342
24: 36–37 173 Raẓiya Sulṭān 1–3, 142, 365, 392, 394, 413
30:22 98 research methods 25–27
33:28–29 95–96 ribāṭs (hospices) see Sufi lodges
33:32 96 Risala al-qushayriyya (Qushayrī) 65–66
60:12 148, 151 Risālā Siyaru’l Aqṭāb (Chishtī) 166, 343,
women’s status in 6 382
Qur’an and Woman: Rereading the Sacred Text Risāla-yi ṣāḥibiyya (Jahān Ārāʾ Begam) 63,
from a Woman’s Perspective (Wadud) 6 75, 448–452
Qushayrī, Abu’l Qāsim 60, 65–66, 69 Rishī‌namā (Bahāu’d-Dīn Mattu) 248, 352,
Quṭb Shāh 302 353
Quṭb-i ʿĀlam see Ḥaqq, Nūru’l Ritter, Hellmut 207
Quṭbu’d-Dīn, Shaikh (d. 1601) 423 Rizvi, Saiyid Athar Abbas 61, 219
Quṭbu’d-Dīn Bakhtiyār Kākī (d. 1235) 111, Roded, Ruth 13–14, 68
115, 131, 186, 391–393 Ruknu’d-Dīn, Shaikh (d. 1575/1576) 344–345
Quṭbu’d-Dīn Sihālwī Shahīd (d. 1691) 280 Ruknu’d-Dīn Abu’l Faṭh/Rukn-i- ʿĀlam
(d. 1335) 42, 384, 387
Rābiʿa al-ʿAdawiyya Ruknu’d-Dīn Firūz (d. 1263) 3
biographies of 7, 8 Rūmī 11, 15
in Kashfu’l Maḥjūb 69 Rushd Nāmā (Quddūs Gangohī) 36
status of 66–67, 136 Rustam ʿAlī 293
mention of 162, 267, 276, 323
Rābiʿa Balkhi see Rābiʿa (daughter of Kʿāb) Saʿadi Lahorī 366
Rāʿbia Baṣari 80 Ṣābirī Chishtī Rampurī, Muḥammad
Rābiʿa of Bengal/Ḥaẓrat Bānu Zuhrā Ḥasan 54, 231, 382, 453, 498–507
Khatūn 332–333 Ṣādīq, Luṭfu’llah Khan Bahādur 328
Rābiʿa (daughter of Kʿāb) 205–207 Ṣadru’d-Dīn, Qāẓī 280–281
Rābiʿa Khānam 328 Ṣadru’d-Dīn ʿĀrif Qattāl 42, 385, 387
Rābiʿa al-Quzdārī see Rābiʿa (daughter of Ṣafīnatu’l Awliyāʾ (Dārā Shikūh) 74–75, 110,
Kʿāb) 370
Rabia(film) 207 Ṣafiu’d-Dīn, Saiyyid 257
Rafiqi, Abdul Qaiyyum 352 Ṣafīu’llah, Qayyūm-i Jahan 159, 172, 334, 335,
Raja Kanak/Raja Ganesh 211 336, 337, 338
Rāji, Bibi (Queen of Sharqi Sultanate) 179 Ṣafūrā Qādirīyyā̇/Māʾī Sapūran 292–293
Rājī Laulashtī 314 Safūri, Ṣaleḥ Muḥammad 293
586 Index

Ṣaghānī, Maulānā Raẓiu’d-Dīn Ḥasan sex/sexual urges

99–100 slave girls/maidservants for 137
Ṣāḥib, Shah 367 suppressing of 120–125
Sāʿīd, Aḥmad (d. 1935) 321, 428, 430 wives and 113
Saʿīd Khan 277 Shādī b. Yaʿqūb b. Muḥammad Kabīr 373,
Saidānī Bībī/Nādān Bībī 314–315 374
Saidānī Ṣaḥiba/Bībī Saiyyidānī 319 Shādī Khan 275
Saifu’d-Dīn Bākhrāzī 189–190 Shāh, Imtiyāz Ḥussain 293
Saifullah Qādirī Shaṭṭārī Sibghat Allāh 273, Shah, Sayyid Jamāl 460
286 Shāh Jahan, Mughal Emperor (d. 1666) 63,
Saiyyid Muḥammad Shuʿaib 297 75, 179, 190, 212, 342, 367, 368, 447–448,
Saiyyid Salār Masʿūd Ghāzī (Ghāzī 449
Miyān) 53 Shah Jo Risālo (Bhit Shah) 19, 475
Saiyyida Bībī Āmna 471–472 Shāh Miyāṅ (Nijātu’llah, Saiyyid ) 291n327
Saiyyida Bībī Banū 471–472 Shāh nāma-ye Hind (ʿIṣāmī) 2
Saiyyida Ḥāfiza Bībī 414–415 Shāh Parioṅ jo Āsitāna (Shrine of the King
Saiyyida Khadīja Bībī 472–474, 473 Fairies) 315–318, 317–318, 444
Saiyyidʾus-Sādāt Muḥammad Ḥanīf 253 Shāhbāz, Shāh 184
Sakhī Bī Jī Sarkār Qalandarī 492 Shāhul Ḥamīd Nagori 188, 274
Sakinatu’l Awliyāʾ (Dārā Shikūh) 75 Shaikh, Saʿdiyya 10
Salamah-Qudsi, Arin Shawkat 15–16 shaikhas
Salāmān wa Absāl (Jāmī) 67 restrictions against 11, 88, 89
Ṣāleḥ, Muḥammad 293 see also khalifas
Ṣalehā Mā Ṣāḥiba 284 shajara (lineage) 105–106, 298, 368, 386,
salt, healing powers of 309, 316, 318, 439, 389
476, 493 Shakūru’d-Dīn Walī, Bābā 352
Samʾani, Aḥmad 91 Shāmma Bībī 349–351
Sāmānī, Muḥammad ʿAli 411 Shamnā Mīrāṅ (Shamsu’d-Dīn) 377
Sangha Bībī 351–353 Shams ul-ʿUshshāq (Mīrāṅ Ḥusainī) 377
al-Sarrāj, Abū Naṣr 49–50, 130 Shamsu’d-Dīn (nephew of Amīr Ḥasan
Sastri, Hirananda 313 Sijzī) 119
Satīuʾn Nisāʾ 448 Shamsu’d-Dīn (Shamnā Mīrāṅ) 377
sattioṅ jo āstāno (shrine of the chaste Shamsu’d-Dīn, Khwāja (Ghāzī Bābā)
women) 441, 444 239–240
Sayyida Junaid Bībī see Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh/ Shamsu’d-Dīn, Muḥammad 371
Sayyida Junaid Bībī/Mirāṅ Pīr Shamsu’l-ʿᾹrifīn ʿAbdu’l Wahīd 41
Sayyida Nafīsa 8 Sharaḥ Jawāmiu’l kilam (Ḥusainī) 412
Schimmel, Annemarie 5, 9, 73–74 al-Shaʿranī, ʿAbd al-Wahāb 161–162
segregation of women Sharīfa Khatūn (daughter of Muḥammad
in general 198–201 Fāzil) 157, 294–296
during initiation 153–154 Sharma, Sunil 207
views on Shaṭṭārī, Muḥammad Ghausī 182
of Amīr Khusraw 81–82 Sher Shāh Suri, Sultan of Delhi 268,
of Gangohī, Rashīd Aḥmad 200 269–270
of Simnānī, Muḥammad Ashraf Shibli Academy 37n23
Jahāngīr 200 Shihābu’d-Dīn (Pīr‌Jug‌Jot) 209–210
of Thanāwī, Ashraf ʿAlī 200–201 Shihābu’d-Dīn, Maulānā 133
Seven Virtuous Ladies (Ḥaft ʿAfīfa) 80, Shihābu’d-Dīn Abu Bakr 304, 305
441–444 Shihābu’d-Dīn Qattāl Zāhid 358
Index 587

Shirāzī, Mirza Mehdi 79–80, 443 views on

Shīrāzī, Shukru’llah 322 of Aḥmad Raza Khan Fāzil
Shorish (Muḥammad Shāh Āyatullah) 297 Barelwī 198
Shrine of the King Fairies (Shāh Parioṅ jo of Dargāh Qulī Khān 196
Āsitāna) 315–318, 317–318, 444 of Gīsū Darāz 187–188
shrine visitations of Ismāʿīl Shahīd, Muḥammad 197
etiquette of 85–86 of Jān-i-Jānāṅ, Mazhar 195
menstruation and 317 of Manerī, Sharfu’d-Dīn Yāhyā 188
replacing Ḥajj 187–188 of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 187
restrictions on of Qalandar, Turāb ʿ‌Alī 196
for females 470, 481–482 of Qannaujī, Ṣiddīq Ḥasan Khan 198
for males 389, 391, 472, 481, 494 of Shahul Hamid 188
to shrines of Sufi men by women
Abū Yazīd Basṭāmi 195 in general 16, 21, 26–27, 191–195
ʿAlī Datār, Mirāṅ Saiyyid 463–464, disapproval of 195–198
464–467, 465, 466, 467 gender discrimination at 192
Pīr Ghāyab Shāh 458 Jahān Ārāʾ Begum 190–191, 448
to shrines of Sufi women popularity in 18th century 196
in general 192, 510 visibility of 27–28
Amma Bībī Maryam 458, 459, 460 see also shrines
Amma Bī/Maḥmūdā Bībī 493 shrines
Amma Khairuʾn-nisāʾ 456, 457 in general 20–21, 84–85, 185–190
Bakhtūʾī, Dādī 239 ablution of sins and 195
Bībī ʿĀʾisha 232 disapproval of 185–186
Bībī Ashraf Jahāṅ Ḥaẓrat Mā grants/patronage for 185
Ṣāḥiba 234 income of 38n26, 85, 86, 441, 460, 467,
Bībī Maryam Bukhārī Shahīd 460 475, 477, 489, 493
Bībī of Kamāl/Kamālo 26–27, management of 83, 182, 444, 475, 476,
213–214 487–488
Bībī Rāstī 391 neglect of 83–85, 313, 380, 391
Bībīaṅ Pākdāman 490 oral traditions and 83, 86–87
Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ 437–438 performances at 194
Ḥaft ʿAfīfa 441, 444 replacing Kʿaba 187–188
Harro Bībī 263 replicas of 462
Hujwīrī, Abu’l Ḥasan ʿAlī 437 as sacred spaces 20–21
Māʾī Maklī 309 singers at 19
Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh/Sayyida Junaid Bībī/ studies on 16–17, 83–87
Mirāṅ Pīr 193, 478, 479–480 of Sufi girl-children 433
Pākdāman Bībīāṅ 494 of Sufi men
Punch Bībīāṅ Ṣaḥeba 251 Abdullah Shāh Ghāzī 28, 193
Saiyyida Bībī Āmna 472 Abū Yazīd al-Basṭāmi 195
Saiyyida Bībī Banū 472 Aḥmad Bādpā 270
Saiyyida Ḥāfiza Bībī 415 ʿAinu’d-Dīn Ganju’l ʿIlm Junaidī 246
Saiyyida Khadīja Bībī 474 ʿAlāu’d-Dīn Ṣābir 454
of Zachchā Bībī 225 ʿAlawī, Hāshim Ḥusainī 284
tying of threads/ribbons during 189, Bāqī Billah 380
232, 239, 251, 309, 319, 439, 464–465 Bāwa Gor 193, 194
588 Index

shrine (cont.) Bībī Būbū Abādī 234, 238

Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb 253 Bībī Fāṭima 239–240
Chatrīwālī Sarkar 489 Bībī Fāṭima Saiyyida Gilānī 258–259,
Chishtī, Amānat ʿAlī 299 260
Fatḥ ʿAlī Wāʾisī 332 Bībī Fāṭima Sām 413–414
Ḥabīb Allāh Ṣibghat Allāhī 286 Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl 343
Ḥamīdu’d-Dīn Suwalī 221 Bībī Ḥājara/Mā Ṣāḥiba 44, 371, 372
Hujwīrī 40 Bībī Ḥalīma 368
Kāmil, Miāṅ Muḥammad 299 Bībī Jawindī 240–241, 242–243
Manerī, Sharfu’d-Dīn Yāhyā 212 Bībī Jawindī/Zinda Ahadi 84
Mangho Pīr 193–194 Bībī Jīū/Jī 375
Mʿāshūq Rabbānī 434–435 Bībī Kamāl/Kamālo 26–27, 85, 208,
Miāṅ Mastān Shāh xii 212–214
Mīrāṅ Ḥusainī 377 Bībī Khadīja 221
Mirāṅ Saiyyid ʿAlī Datār 463–464, Bībī Khunza [Khunjā] Sulṭāna 376,
465, 466, 467 377, 378
chilla 461–467 Bībī Khwānd Mā Ṣ̣āḥiba/Māh
female shrines within 467–468 Khātūn 246
healing rituals at 468–470 Bībī Khwurd 416
Muntajibu’d-Dīn 371 Bībī Māhlat 281
Mūsā Āhangar Suhrawardī 265 Bībī Māhnau 270
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 27 Bībī Maryam Bukhārī
Nūrī Bābā 85–86 Shahīd 460–461
Pīr Ghāʾib Ṣāḥib/Qadirī, Ḥasan 324 Bībī Nānī 310, 312
Pīr Saiyyid Walī Muḥammad 492, Bībī Nekzan/Bībī Nāhzan 313
492 Bībī Nūrbharī 431
Qalandar, Turāb ʿAlī 288n313 Bībī Qādirīyyā 283
Qalandar Lal Shahbaz 20, 21 Bībī Rāstī 388, 389, 390, 391
Shāhul Ḥamīd Nagori 274 Bībī Raushan Ārāʾ 252
Shamnā Mīrāṅ (Shamsu’d-Dīn) 377 Bībī Saiyyidānī/Saidānī Ṣaḥiba 319
Shamsu’d-Dīn (Ghāzī Bābā) 240 Bībī Shamsa Mā Ṣāḥiba 273
Shīrāzī, Shukru’llah 322 Bībī Tārī 322
Sirāju’d-Dīn Junaidī 326 Bībī Umm-i Ḥabība 470, 471
Zinda Pīr 17 Bībī Zulaikhā 400
of Sufi women Bībīaṅ Pākdāman 489
in general 510 Bībīāṅ Pākdāmnāṅ 437, 438–439,
Amma Bībī Maryam 458, 458–459, 440, 441
460 in Bidar 254
Amma Khairuʾn-nisāʾ 456, 457 of the chaste women 441, 444
appearance of 85 Hāro Ana 307, 308
Bakhtūʾī, Dādī 238, 239 Harro Bībī 262, 263, 264–265,
Bānu Zuhrā Khatūn 333 265–266
Bāqī Billah’s mother 380 Hasti Bībī 84
Beemā Bīwī 304 Ḥaẓrat Bābājān 426
Bī Mayya xii Haẓrat Shah ʿAbdu’l Mannān
Bībī ʿĀʾisha 230, 232 Ḥuẓūrī 490–491, 491
Bībī Ashraf Jahāṅ Ḥaẓrat Mā Jahān Ᾱrāʾ Begam 27
Ṣāḥiba 234 Khujasta Akhtar/Bībī Abdāl 358
Bībī Bandagī Ḥusainī 276–277 Khwashtarā Bībī 279
Index 589

Māʾī Gāŕhī 474–476 as singers 19

Māʾī Khadīja 300 visitations of see shrine visitations
Māʾī Lānjī 476–477 Shuʿaib Firdawsī (d. 1895) 133
Māʾī Meharbān 493–494 Ṣibghat Allāh, Muḥammad 367
Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh/Sayyida Junaid Bībī/ Sibi District Gazetteer (McConaghey) 495
Mirāṅ Pīr 477–488 Siddiqi, Iqtidar Husain 61
in general 86–87, 476–480 Ṣifāt al Ṣifwā (ʿAlī b. al-Jawzī) 66
management of 487–488 silsilas
as space for women organisational patterns of 146–147
bonding 486–487 surveys of 72
visitations of 193 women’s presence in
Māʾī Nūruʾn nisāʾ Begam 303–304 in general 146–147
Māʾī Sapūraṅ/Ṣafūrā Qādirīyyā 292, arguments against 159–162
293 as disciples 147–159
Maklī, Māʾī 309 as khalifas see khalifas
Mihirbān, Māʾī 214 as shaikhas, restrictions against 11,
Mukhaddarāt Abdāliyā 310 88, 89
Mukkā Bī 85 as Sufis 162–165
Pākdāman Bībīāṅ 494 Silvers, Laury 6
Pānch Bībī kī Dargāh 313 Simnānī, Muḥammad Ashraf Jahāngīr 68,
Pānch Bībioṅ (five sisters) 250 168, 186–187, 200
Punch Bībīāṅ Ṣaḥeba 251 singers 19–20
Qadam, Māʾī/Jījā Mīrāṅ 314 Sirāju’d-Dīn Junaidī (d. 1379) 226, 233, 249,
Quraish Bībī 283 326, 371
Rābiʿa (daughter of Kʿāb) 207 Sirāju’d-Dīn Junaidī (d. 1393) 246
Saidānī Bībī/Nādān Bībī 314–315 Sīrat-un Nabī (Nadwī) 37n23
Saiyyida Bībī Āmna 471–472 Sirhindī, Aḥmad 127–129, 159
Saiyyida Bībī Banū 471–472 Sirhindī, Badru’d-Din 380
Saiyyida Ḥāfiza Bībī 414–415 Sittī Mā Ṣaḥiba 285–286
Saiyyida Khadīja Bībī 472, 473 Siyar-i Muḥammadi (Sāmānī) 411
Sakhī Bī Jī Sarkār Qalandarī 492 Siyaru’l Aqṭāb (Chishtī) 39
Ṣalehā Mā Ṣāḥiba 284 Siyaru’l Awliyāʾ (Amīr Khwurd) see Amīr
Sangha Bībī 353 Khwurd
sattioṅ jo āstāno 441, 444 Siyaru’l ʿᾹrifīn (Jamālī) 60, 72, 221, 235, 385,
Sayyida Nafīsa 8 395
Shāh Parioṅ jo Āsitāna 315–318, Siyāsat-nāma (Nizāmu’l Mulk Ṭūsī) 92
317–318, 444 slave girls/maidservants
Sittī Mā Ṣaḥiba 286 of Bībī Zulaikhā 139, 398
Sōnā Bāʾī 253 children of 140
as source for study of 83–87 cooking of meals by 93–94
Zachchā Bībī 225, 325–326 gifted as commodities 139
terms for 185 marrying of 141
visiting of see shrine visitations for sexual gratification 137
wayside 85 Sufi men’s views on 137–142
women and Sufi women and 137
in general 21 sleep/sleeping 322, 410
active participation at 17 Smith, Margaret 7, 312
expression of spirituality of 191–195 Sōnā Bāʾī 252–253
590 Index

South Asia arrival of in South Asia 38–39

in general 31 as disciples see under disciples
ethnic diversity in 31–32 etiquettes for disciples of 56–57
Islam in humiliation of, by women 96
arrival of 32–33 jurisdiction of 24, 146–147
converts and 34 mode’s of piety of 508–509
Muslim communities in ix, 31–32, monographs on 7
34, 112 shrines of see under shrines
Sufi lodges (khānqāhs) in supernatural powers after death
associated with a woman 180, of 186–187
436 treatment by
functions of 176–178 of slave girls/maidservants
for Sufi women 179 Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar 139
women’s presence in 180–181, 182, Ḥasan‌Sijzi Dihlawī 141
183–184, 422 Naqīʾud-Dīn Awadhī 142
Sufis’ arrival in 38–39, 41–44 of women
Mongols’ arrival in 33 in general 113–114
Turko-Afghans’ arrival in 32 ʿAlī Aḥmad Ṣābir 116
spiritual charisma (karāmat) Quṭbu’d-Dīn Kākī 115
in general 58 ʿurs celebration for see under ʿurs (death
boundaries of 146–147 anniversary) celebrations
of women Sufis 309, 311, 485, 510 views of
spiritual guides (murshid), Sufi women as on children
18, 120, 161–163, 400–404 Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar
spiritual jurisdiction 24, 146–147 132–133
spiritual lineage see lineage Manerī, Sharfu’d-Dīn Yāhyā
state grants 185 133–134
Stowasser, Barbara 91 Naqīʾud-Dīn Awadhī 134
Sufi (term) al-Sarrāj, Abū Naṣr 130
male connotation of 46–47 on family
use of xii, 45–46, 48 in general 104–105
Sufi girl-children 433–435 children 130–134
Sufi lodges (khānqāhs) mothers, sisters, daughters
in general 106–112
development of 174 Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i
functions of 173–174 Dihlī 104–105
opposition against 175–176 Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 106
for Sufi women 179 on marriage/marital life
in South Asia Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb 118–119
associated with a woman 180, 436 Gīsū Darāz 123
functions of 176–178 Jān-i-Jānāṅ, Mazhar 119
for Sufi women 179 Najību’d-Dīn Mutawakkil 118
women’s presence in Suhrāwardī, Ẓiāu’d-Dīn Abū Najīb
in general 180–181 ʿAbdu’l Qādir 120
in low-cadre functions 183–184 on slave girls/maidservants 137–142
in managerial functions 182, 422 ʿAbdul ʿAzīz Dihlawī 137–138
Sufi men Gīsū Darāz 139–140
as archetypical 93 Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī 140–141
Index 591

on Sufi women arrival of in South Asia 41–44

as men in form of women 15, 89, books by see books by Sufi women
164–165, 268, 324 as disciples see under disciples
Nāzir, Ghulām ʿAbdu’l-Qādir forgotten
on 507 Ahmedabad (Gujarat) 496–497
on wives 112–120 from Balochistan 495–496
on women (in general) of Bengal and Bihar 497
in general 88–90, 509 of Bijapur 497–498
in 17th and 18th century 126–130 invisibility of 23, 509
ʿAbdul ʿAzīz Dihlawī 97–98 as khalifas see khalifas
ʿAbdu’l-Ḥaqq Muḥaddis Dihlawī lack of own writing of 14
(d. 1642/1643) 126–127 language command of 298, 332
Amīr Khusraw 81–82, 109 as men in form of women 15, 89,
Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb 94 164–165, 268, 324
as chaos 88, 90–94 mentioned in Tawārīkh āʿina-yi taṣawwuf
compassionate attitudes (Ṣābirī Chishtī Rampurī) 498–507
towards 134–135 mode’s of piety of 508–510
as deficient in reasoning 4–5, poetry by see under poetry/poets
94–98, 161–162 research on 5–16
Farīdu’d-Dīn Ganj-i Shakkar 89 shrines of see under shrines
Ḥaqq, Nūru’l 134–135 in silsilas see under silsilas
Hidāyat ʿAlī, Muḥammad 161 as spiritual guides 18, 120, 161–163,
Hujwīrī 69–70, 88, 90–92 400–404
Ibrāḥīm b. Adham 93 Sufi lodges and see under Sufi lodges
of ill repute see below taṣawwuf of
Jāmī, ʿAbdur Raḥmān 98 in general ix–x
Kalīmu’llah Jahanābādī 130 taʿabbud as essence of 24
martital life/sex and 120–126 in texts on Sufism see under texts on
Naʿīmu’llah Bahrāʾīchī 102–103 Sufism
Naṣīru’d-Dīn Maḥmūd Chirāgh-i titles for 89
Dihlī 94–97, 118 travels of see travels
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 88–89, ʿurs celebration of see under ʿurs (death
98–99, 100–101, 109, 408–409 anniversary) celebrations
Nizāmu’l Mulk Ṭūsī 92 Sufis (in general)
as personifying evil 89, 98–103 fake 49–50
Ṣaghānī, Maulānā Raẓiu’d-Dīn female see Sufi women
Ḥasan 99–100 ḥadīths on 49
Sirhindī, Aḥmad 127–128 male see Sufi men
ʿAṭṭār, Farīdu’d-Dīn 15, 89, 117–118 supernatural powers after death
Yūsuf Gadā 125–126 of 186–187
on women of ill repute 142–145 veneration of 50–51
ʿAbdul ʿAzīz Dihlawī 144–145 views on
Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb 143–144 of Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 51
Gīsū Darāz 144 of al-Sarrāj 49–50
Nizāmu’d-Dīn Awliyāʾ 142–143 Sufism/taṣawwuf
Sufi women initiation into see initiations
in general ix in Morocco 12
anonymous, from 15th century Muslim views of 46
Bidar 253–254 orders in see silsilas
592 Index

Sufism/taṣawwuf (cont.) Taṅbihu’l Ghāfilīn ( Abu’l Lais

Orientalist view of 45–46 al-Samarqandī) 113
of Sufi women The Tao of Islam: A Sourcebook on Gender
in general ix–x Relationships in Islamic Thought
taʿabbud as essence of 24 (Murata) 10
texts on see texts on Sufism Tārīkh Awliyāʿ-i Dihlī (Sāʿīd, Aḥmad) 321,
views on 428, 430
of Abu’l Ḥasan Nūrī 48–49 Tārīkh Khwāja Muʿinu’d-Dīn Chishtī Ajmerī
of al-Hujwīrī 39, 47–48 (Nizāmi Dihlavī) 343
of Muḥammad b. Tughluq 177 Tārīkh‌Awliya‌ʾ-i (Sāʿīd, Aḥmad) 321
of Murtaʿīsh 49 Tārīkh-i Bilgrām (Bilgrāmī) 416
wool garments and 45 Tārīkh-i Ḥabībī wa Tazkira-yi Murshidi
ṣuḥba/ṣuḥbat 355 (Muḥammad Wāʾiẓī) 122, 152
Suhrawardī, Shihābu’d-Dīn Abū Ḥafs ʿUmar Tārīkh-i Ḥasan (Khuihāmi) 249, 254–255,
(d. 1234/1235) 154, 175–176, 400 256, 350, 352
Suhrawardī, Shihābu’d-Dīn (d. 1191) 209 Tārīkh-i khānjahānī wa Makhzan-i Afghānī
Suhrawardī, Tawakkal Mastān Bābā 319 (Harāwī) 78, 217, 275–276, 320, 432
Suhrāwardī, Ẓiāu’d-Dīn Abū Najīb ʿAbdu’l Tārīkhi-Sind: al-mʿarūf Tārīkh-i-Mʿāsūmī
Qādir 57, 120, 322 (Bhakkari) 369
Sulaiman Dāna 216, 217 taṣawwuf (term)
Sulaimānī, Najmu᾽d-Dīn 342 male connation of 46–47
as-Sulamī, Abū ʿAbdur-Raḥmān 12–13, 24, use of 45–46, 48
59, 68 see also Sufism
Sulayman al Tajjār 33 Tawārīkh āʿina-yi taṣawwuf (Ṣābirī Chishtī
Sulṭān Bāhū 434–435 Rampurī) 54, 382, 498–506
Sultan Jahan Begum, Nawab of Bophal tʿāwīz (protection amulets) xii
158 Tazkira Saiyyid Aḥmad Bādpā (Aḥmad,
Sulṭāna Bībī 274 Shafīq) 269
Sulṭānu’l-Mashāʾīkh see Nizāmu’d-Dīn Tazkirāʾ-i Multan (Shah) 293
Awliyāʾ tazkirāt/tazkira 63, 71–72, 83
Surruʾs-Ṣudūr (Farīdu’d-Dīn) 218 see also under specific tazkirāt
Syed Alaol 126 Tazkiratu’l Awliyāʾ (ʿAṭṭār) 66–67, 162
Syed Muḥammad Wāsil 362 Tazkiratu’l kirām (Abu’ḷayāt Qādirī)
297–298
ṭabaqāt literature Tazkiratʾul kirām-Tārīkh-i-Amroha,‌jild ānī
in general 59–60, 63 (ʿAbbāsī) 299
Sufi women in 72–73 tekkes (resting chambers) see Sufi lodges
see also under specific ṭabaqāt temperament, humans (mizāj) xii
Ṭabaqāt al-Sufiyya (as-Sulamī) 59 Temple, Richard 357n121
tahajjud prayers 111, 115, 161, 354, 451 terminologies, of power 147
Tahzib-un(journal) 247 texts on Sufism 198–201
Tajalliyāt-i‌Raḥmānī (Ḥusainī, ʿAlī in general 54–55
Muḥammad) 287 authored by males, for males, on
Tāju’d-Dīn Sambhalī 340–341 males 53, 55
takyas (resting chambers) see Sufi lodges biographical dictionaries 71, 74, 222,
Talbīs Iblīs (Ibn al-Jawzī) 175 262, 414
talking, with animals 353 hagiographies 52–54 see under specific
Talmīzsāz, ῾Atīqu’llah 420 hagiographies
Index 593

malfūzāt/malfūz see malfūzāt/malfūz Turmān, Miyāṅ 320–321

modern 6–7, 73–74 Turta-turt Bībī 323–324, 507
Sufi women in al-Tustarī, Sahl 163
in general ix–x, 62–65 tying of threads/ribbons 189, 232, 239, 251,
in appendices 73–74, 75, 79 309, 319, 439, 464–465
in modern texts 73–74
omitting of 74 Uchch Sharīf 240–242, 242–243
from outside South Asia 65–68 ʿUmar b. al-Khaṭṭab 140
from within South Asia 68–80 ʿUmar Farūq 293
written by women 75 ʿUmar Khan Sarwānī 170, 344
ṭabaqāt literature 59–60, 63, 72–73 ʿUmar Yaghestani 378
see also under specific ṭabaqāt ʿUmdatu’l Maqāmāt (Naqshbandī)
tazkirāt/tazkira 63, 71–72, 83 333–334
see also under specific tazkirāt Umm-i Ḥabība 510
by venerated Sufis 39–40 al-ʿUnwān fi sulūk an niswān (Muṭṭaqī)
Thanāwī, Ashraf ʿAlī 159, 197, 200–201, 365 114–115
Thatta/Tatta 431 Urdu language 169–170
Thattawī, ‌ʿAlī Sher Qāniʿ 308–309, 315–316, ʿurs (death anniversary) celebrations
369, 431, 441 in general 189–190
Thattawī, Abu’l Sirāj Muḥammad Ṭufail of Sufi men
316 Aḥmad Bādpā 269
Thattawī, Muḥammad ʿĀzam 79, 272, Burhānu’d-Dīn Gharīb 190
305–306, 309–310, 321–322, 442–443 Ghāzī Miyān 53
Three Chaste Veiled Women Abdāl Kausar, Bābā 457
(Mukhaddarāt Abdāliyā) 309–310 Mangho Pīr 193
Tokhtah Tirmizī, Aḥmad 438 Shāhul Ḥamīd Nagori 274
tombs see shrines of Sufi women
travels in general 189
of Sufi women Beemā Bīwī 305
in general 41–44 Bībī Ashraf Jahāṅ Ḥaẓrat Mā
Bībī Ṣāḥiba/Bībī Kalāṅ/Bībī Ṣāḥiba 234
Qayyūmi 338 Bībī Fāṭima 240
Māʾī Nūruʾn nisāʾ Begam 303 Bībī Fāṭima Sām 414
miraculous 314 Bībī Ḥāfiz Jamāl 343
Pānch Bībioṅ 249 Bībī Khunza [Khunjā] Sulṭāna 377,
Shāmma Bībī 351 378
see also Ḥajj pilgrimage Bībī Raushan Ārāʾ 252
of women, in general 34 Dāmā Mā 468
see also mobility of women Māʾī Gāŕhī 475
Troll, Christian W. 211 Māʾī Meharbān 493
Tuḥfahtu’l-Kirām (Thattawī, ʿ‌Alī Sher Māʾī Mirāṅ Shāh/Sayyida Junaid Bībī/
Qāniʿ) 308–309, 315–316, 369, 431, 441 Mirāṅ Pīr 86, 478, 486
Tuḥfā-i-naṣāʾiḥ (Gadā) 125–126 permissibility of 457, 470, 494
Tuḥfatu’l-ṭāhirīn (Thattawī, Muḥammad Punch Bībīāṅ Ṣaḥeba 251
ʿĀzam) 79, 272, 305–306, 309–310, Rāstī Mā and Dādi Mā 468
321–322, 442–443 Saiyyida Khadīja Bībī 474
Turabi, Kafeel 212 Sulṭāna Bībī 274
Turko-Afghans 32
594 Index

veiling of women (parda) Wāqiʿāt-i Mamlukat-i‌Bījāpūr (Aḥmad) 250,

in general 2, 198–199 376–377
female disciples and 160 Wāris ʿAli Bengali 332
interactions with men without 224, water, healing powers of 378, 391, 474,
225, 296 491
views on Watto Shoryānī, Shaikh 76
of ʿAbdu’l-Ḥaqq Muḥaddis Dihlawī wayside shrines 85
(d. 1642/1643) 394 Werbner, Pnina 17–18
of Amīr Khusraw 81–82 wilāyat (Sufi’s jurisdiction) 24, 146–147
of Gangohī, Rashīd Aḥmad 200 Wilāyat Sharfu’d-Dīn ʿAlī 238–239
of Ilyās, Muḥammad 201 wives
of ʿIṣāmī, Abdul Malik 2 as disciples 116–117, 153
of Maudūdi, Abul ʿAlā 4 disobedience of 113–115
of Simnānī, Muḥammad Ashraf Ḥadīth on 113
Jahāngīr 200 of Muḥammad, Prophet 95–96
of Thanāwī, Ashraf ʿAlī 200–201 sex and 113
women as 112–120
Wadud, Amīna 6, 91 women (in general)
Wais Sarwānī 432 in general ix, 34
Wajīhu’d-Dīn Ashraf adultery and 103, 129
family/descendants of, daughter of advice to 81–82, 109, 128–129
209 anonymity of 108
views of as disciples see under disciples
on Bībī Ārām Ḥaṣūr 406 divorce and 10, 115, 128
on Bībī Bū Abadī 235, 236–237 as fakirs 21
on Bībī Jīyā 291 Ḥadīth on 91–92, 98, 99–100, 113, 160
on Bībī Khadīja 221 hands of, touching of 102, 148, 151
on Bībī Khwurd 416 humiliating men 96
on Bībī Māhlat 279 Ibn ʿArabī on 10
on Bībī Sāra 393–394 mobility of xi–xii, 161, 196, 197, 201
on Harro Bībī 262 moral conduct of 81–82, 109, 128–129
on Ḥaẓrat Bībī Makhdūma 401–402 oaths of allegiance (baiʿāt) and 129,
on Majzūba of 147–148, 150–152, 157
Muḥammadpur 425–426 polygamy and 128
on Pīr Badr 357 possessed 27, 213, 464–465, 468–469,
works of, Bahr-e-Zakhkhar 78, 216, 472
221, 235, 236–237, 262, 279, 291, 357, public discourse on, evasion of 53–54
401–402, 406, 416, 425, 496 role of
Wajihu’d-Dīn Khijwandī 382 in fall of Adam xi, 91, 92, 99–100
Wālājāh i, Nawab 324 at shrines see Sufi women
Wālājāh iv, ʿAzam Jāh Bahādur Nawāb 323, segregation of see segregation of women
325, 414–415, 507 silsilas and see under silsilas
Walī Ullāh Ḥusainī 277 status in Qurʾān 6
Walīullah Dihlawī (d. 1762/1763) 157, 197, Sufi men’s views on see Sufi men
294–296 veiling of see veiling of women
Wāqiʿāt Dāru’l Ḥukūmat Dihlī (Aḥmad) 83, Women, Saints and Sanctuaries
428, 430 (Mernissi) 16
Index 595

Women in Islamic Biographical Collections: yogi, contestations between Sufis and

From Ibn Saʿd to Who’s Who (Roded) 38–39
13–14, 68 Yusuf Batukzaʾī 281, 282
Women in the Qurʾan, Traditions, and Yūsuf Gadā 125–126
Interpretation (Stowasser) 91
Women Mentors of Men (Aftab) xiii Zachcha Bī 250–251
Women Mystics and Sufi Shrines in India Zachchā Bībī 225–226
(Pemberton) 18 Zahiru’d Dīn Saiyyid Aḥmad 145
women of ill repute Zainu’d-Dīn ʿAlī Awadhi (son of Bībī Būbū
funeral prayers for 144 Abādī) 236, 237, 238
initiation of 144–145 Zainu’d-Dīn Shīrāzī 244–245
repentance of 142–143 Zamān, Ḥāfiz Muḥammad 494
Sufi men’s views on 142–145 Zar Zari Zar-Bakhsh (Muntajibu’d-Dīn) 44,
women’s galleries (zenanas) 179 253, 372
wooden cribs (alams) 439 zāwiyas (retreats) see Sufi lodges
wool garments 45 zenanas (women’s galleries) 179
Zihrat nama (Gurgānī) 54
Yā ʿAlī 311 zikr performance 354, 403
Yad Ullāh Shāh (Qabūlā Ḥusainī) 435 Zinda Ahadi/Bībī Jawindī 84, 240–243
Yaghestani, ʿUmar 43 Zinda Pīr (d. 1999) 17
Yaḥyā, Shaikh 236 Zubaidā Bībī 493
Yaḥyā Kabīr 320, 432 Zubairī, Muḥammad Ibrāhīm 79, 250, 273,
Yaʿqūb Chishtī 376 282–283, 284, 285, 287–288, 314, 367
Yaʿqūb Mashhadī 442 Zubdatu’l-Muqāmāt (Hāshim Kishmī)
Yazdani, Ghulam 85, 253, 261, 270–271, 340–341, 379–380
276–277, 435