Paper long abstract:

This paper traces the changing ways in which Persian men of letters enacted and made meaning of devotion to the Twelve Imams (descendants of the Prophet Muḥammad through 'Alī), in 15th-17th century Transoxiana (Central Asia) and Khurasan. In this context, devotion to the Imams was not limited to Twelver Shi`is; Maḥjūb uses the term "Twelver Sunni" to indicate Sunnis who revered the Imams (Maḥjūb, 1984). This paper's main sources are Persian taẕkiras ("mementos") of poets, commemorative works that recorded poets' lives and compositions. The period following the 1507 fall of the Timurid empire (based in Herat), is sometimes associated with political and sectarian rupture in the Persianate ecumene, with Shi`i Safavids in Iran, Sunni Mughals in India, and Sunni Uzbeks in Transoxiana. However, this paper suggests that it is inadvisable to abstract the question of sectarian relations from the discursive traditions through which they were imagined. Taẕkiras refract the social through the poetic, thereby creating different possibilities for the portrayal of sectarian relations than may appear in other forms of writing, such as court chronicles.

In the taẕkiras, as the sacred figures of the Imams were invoked anew, these invocations took on new meanings. In some cases, devotion to the Imams was claimed for Sunnism, as in Dawlatshāh Samarqandī's Taẕkirat al-Shu'arā' (Herat, 1487). However, in other taẕkiras, devotion to the Imams could take on a cast of sectarian ambiguity, appearing in accounts of poets who refused to identify as Sunni or Shi`i. This sectarian ambiguity was sometimes described as vus'at-i mashrab, indicating an openness in one's nature toward all apparent contrasts: Hindu and Muslim, infidel and believer, Sunni and Shi`i. Vus'at-i mashrab has attracted some scholarly attention in the context of the religious syncretism promoted by the Mughal emperor Akbar (r. 1556-1605). However, this paper notes the importance of Transoxiana in this development as well, especially given the role of Mashhad (in eastern Iran) as a liminal space, where the shrine to the eighth Imam attracted poets in this vein. Thus, I argue that expressions of devotion to the Imams came to play a role in the ways in which Persian poets and men of letters cultivated sectarian ambiguity, both gesturing towards and, at the same time, sidestepping sectarian distinctions.