Religious Individualisations: Historical and Comparative Perspectives, editors Martin Fuchs, Antje Linkenbach, Martin Mulsow, Bernd-Christian Otto, Rahul Parson and Jörg Rüpke, 2020
We open with a verse from a mid-18th century Punjabi-language poetic narrative by Waris Shah, nam... more We open with a verse from a mid-18th century Punjabi-language poetic narrative by Waris Shah, named for its heroine, Hīr: hauka phire deṅdā piṅdāṅ vicha sāre "āo, kise faqīra je hovnā je" maṅga khāvnā kama nah kāja karnā, na ko chārnā, te nah hī chovnā je żarā kana paṛāike svāha malnī gūrū sāre hī jaga dā hovnā je nah dīhāṛ nah kasaba rozgāra karnā bādshāha phira mufta dā hovnā je nahīṅ denī vadhāī phira jamne dī kise moe nūṅ mūla nah rovnā je maṅga khāvnā ate masīta sonā nah kujha bovnā te nah kujha lovnā je nāle maṅgnā te nāle ghornāi den dāra nah kise da hovnā je khushī āpnī uṭhnā miyāṅ vāriša ate āpnī nīṅda hī sovnā je (Šābir 1986, 144f., v. 254).
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Papers by Anne Murphy
This article argues for the value of looking past the emperor Aurangzeb, in seeking to understand how he has been portrayed. The eighteenth-century Braj source from Punjab examined here portrays local debates and conflicts at the centre, and the Mughal state at the periphery, of the project of communitarian self-formation. Here, the emperor operates from the outside. Internal communitarian concerns, particularly regarding caste inclusion, dominate, linking the text in question to larger questions around caste and community that emerged in early modern South Asia in a range of contexts. Aurangzeb/Alamgir figures most prominently in Sikh historiographical sources in association with two events: the arrest and execution of the ninth Guru, Tegh Bahadur, and the assault and seizure of the Sikh centre of Anandpur during the tenure of the tenth Guru, Gobind Singh. The greatest periods of open conflict between Sikhs and the state occurred after the death of Aurangzeb, including a period of widespread revolt under a follower of Guru Gobind Singh, Banda Bahadur, in the second decade of the eighteenth century and just after the death of the Guru, and two particularly deadly periods of persecution in following decades. 1 Sikh relations with Mughal authority had not however always been so fraught. Under Akbar's long rule, from 1556 to 1605, the Sikh community had flourished under the third, fourth, and fifth Gurus, growing into a sizable and prominent community in Punjab centred from the time of the fourth Guru at Ramdaspur, the modern city of Amritsar. It was with the ascension of the emperor Jahangir to the throne in 1605 (which he occupied until 1627) that Sikh relations with the state took an agonistic turn, culminating in the execution of the fifth Guru. 2 The long reign of Aurangzeb (1658-1707) corresponds, in Sikh communitarian terms, with the period of Guruship of the four final Gurus:
This article argues for the value of looking past the emperor Aurangzeb, in seeking to understand how he has been portrayed. The eighteenth-century Braj source from Punjab examined here portrays local debates and conflicts at the centre, and the Mughal state at the periphery, of the project of communitarian self-formation. Here, the emperor operates from the outside. Internal communitarian concerns, particularly regarding caste inclusion, dominate, linking the text in question to larger questions around caste and community that emerged in early modern South Asia in a range of contexts. Aurangzeb/Alamgir figures most prominently in Sikh historiographical sources in association with two events: the arrest and execution of the ninth Guru, Tegh Bahadur, and the assault and seizure of the Sikh centre of Anandpur during the tenure of the tenth Guru, Gobind Singh. The greatest periods of open conflict between Sikhs and the state occurred after the death of Aurangzeb, including a period of widespread revolt under a follower of Guru Gobind Singh, Banda Bahadur, in the second decade of the eighteenth century and just after the death of the Guru, and two particularly deadly periods of persecution in following decades. 1 Sikh relations with Mughal authority had not however always been so fraught. Under Akbar's long rule, from 1556 to 1605, the Sikh community had flourished under the third, fourth, and fifth Gurus, growing into a sizable and prominent community in Punjab centred from the time of the fourth Guru at Ramdaspur, the modern city of Amritsar. It was with the ascension of the emperor Jahangir to the throne in 1605 (which he occupied until 1627) that Sikh relations with the state took an agonistic turn, culminating in the execution of the fifth Guru. 2 The long reign of Aurangzeb (1658-1707) corresponds, in Sikh communitarian terms, with the period of Guruship of the four final Gurus: