Paper short abstract:

This paper studies petitions to reveal how Abdullah Khan Firuz Jang (d.1636), a Central Asian immigrant to Mughal India modified the political practice of himayat championed by his ancestor Khwaja Ahrar and used his connections to the Juybari Sufi network to challenge existing visions of empire.

Paper long abstract:

This paper studies the life and career of Abdullah Khan Firuz Jang (d.1636), a Central Asian immigrant to India, a military commander and governor serving the Mughal Empire, a disciple of the Bukharan Juybari Sufi master Khwaja Abd al-Rahim, and a descendant of the influential fifteenth-century Naqshbandi Sufi master Khwaja Ubayd Allah Ahrar. Placing an unstudied collection of Firuz Jang’s petitions and battlefield reports addressed to the Mughal Emperor Shah Jahan in conversation with other sources, most notably the hagiographies of the Juybari Sufis, this paper reveals the interaction between Central Asian Sufism, Mughal political systems, and a Mughal nostalgia for the Timurid Empire. It particularly argues that, as a descendant of Ahrar, Firuz Jang was able to practice a modified form of himayat or political and economic support, that had once been championed by his illustrious ancestor in the courts of the Mughals’ Timurid forbears. Engaging with prior scholarship on himayat in Timurid Central Asia, this paper pays critical attention to the tone and vocabulary adopted in these petitions, to demonstrate how Firuz Jang managed this older practice within the newer framework of a Mughal fiscal-military system. With this prudent phrasing in his petitions and epistles, Firuz Jang was able to find a space for himself where he could present himself as a descendant of the revered shaykh and as a “Sufi of the State” who shared a divinely bestowed sovereignty with the Emperor. He was also able to conversely present himself a “devotee” and “slave” dependent on the Emperor for favors that were accrued to Firuz Jang’s subordinate officers via himayat. This paper argues that these appeals were made possible by Shah Jahan’s strong nostalgia for the Central Asian empire of his Timurid ancestors where sovereignty was shared with Ahrar and that Firuz Jang was able to use this dynastic memory to secure his own political ambitions. It also describes some of the other ways in which Firuz Jang nurtured these ambitions in Mughal India, particularly his reliance on the transregional networks of the Juybari Sufis in Central Asia. These Sufis used their political, spiritual, and economic influence, along with their understanding of material cultures and diplomacy, to offer rare objects like walrus tusks to Mughal emperors and negotiate on Firuz Jang’s behalf. This paper thus engages with the larger discussion on varying visions of empire and frontier in the post-Timurid worlds of Central and South Asia.