Amir Khusrau Quotes

His genius, if not character, helped him spend “the whole of his life in spinning yarn” (or writing many untruths).

During the attack, the catapults were busily plied on both sides… ‘Praise be to God for his exaltation of the religion of Muhammad. It is not to be doubted that stones are worshipped by Gabrs,74 but as the stones did no service to them, they only bore to heaven the futility of that worship, and at the same time prostrated their devotees upon earth’…

Conquest of Chitor On Monday, the 8th Jumada-s sani, A.H. 702, the loud drums proclaimed the royal march from Delhi, undertaken with a view to the capture of Chitor. The author accompanied the expedition. The fort was taken on Monday, the 11lth of Muharram, A.H. 703 (August, 1303 A.D.). The Rai fled, but afterwards surrendered himself, and was secured against lightning of the scimitar. The Hindus say that lightning falls wherever there is a brazen vessel, and the face of the Rai had become as yellow as one, through the effect of fear... After ordering a massacre of thirty thousand Hindus, he bestowed the Government of Chitor upon his son, Khizr Khan, and named the place Khizrabad. He bestowed on him a red canopy, a robe embroidered with gold, and two standards – one green, and the other black – and threw upon him rubies and emeralds. He then returned towards Delhi. “Praise be to God that he so ordered the massacre of all the chiefs of Hind out of the pale of Islam, by his infidel-smiling sword, that if in this time it should by chance happen that a schismatic should claim his right, the pure Sunnis would swear in the name of this Khalifa of God, that heterodoxy has no rights.”

There was another rai in those parts, whose rule extended over sea and land, a Brahmin named Pandya Guru. He had many cities in his possession, and his capital was Fatan, where there was a temple with an idol in it laden with jewels… The rai, when the army of the Sultan arrived at Fatan, fled away, and what can an army do without its leader? The Musalmans in his service sought protection from the king's army, and they were made happy with the kind of reception they met. 500 elephants were taken. They then struck the idol with an iron hatchet, and opened its head. Although it was the very Kibla of the accursed gabrs, it kissed the earth and filled the holy treasury.

Conquest of Tilang (excerpt) On Sunday, the 13th, a day dedicated to the sun, the attack was renewed, and cries of “huzza huzz” and “khuzza khuzz,” the acclamation of the triumph of holy Warriors arose. They took fire with them, and threw it into the places of retreat of the Gabrs, who worshipped fire. By Wednesday, the whole of the outer wall was in possession of the Musulmans. They then saw the inner fortress, which was built of stone. You might have said it was the fort of Nai, in which the air is as much lost as in a reed. When the army reached the inner ditch, they swam across it, and commenced a vigorous attack on one of the stone bastions, which so alarmed Rai Laddar Deo that he offered terms of capitulation. He despatched confidential messengers to offer an annual payment of tribute: and sent a golden image of himself, with a golden chain round Its neck, In acknowledgment of his submission. “When the messengers of the Rai came before the red canopy, which is the honored harbinger of victory and triumph, they rubbed their yellow faces on the earth till the ground itself acquired their colour, and they drew out their tongues in eloquent Hindui more cutting than a Hindi sword, and they delivered the message of the Rai.... The idol-breaking Malik comprehended the gilding of the Hindus, and paid no regard to their glozing speech and would not look towards that golden image, but he (“a part of the second Alexander”) ordered his officers to take the gold that was brought and suspend operations against the fort. He demanded, in reply everything that [p. 89] the Rai’s country produced from vegetables, mines, and animals. On this condition the fort-taking Malik stretched forth his right hand, and placed his sword in his scabbard, and struck his open hand, by way of admonition, so forcibly on the backs of the basiths that he made them bend under the blow. They hastened to the fort, trembling like quick-silver. The Rai was engaged all night in accumulating his treasures and wealth, and next morning his officers returned with elephants, treasures, and horses, before the red canopy, which is the dawn of the eastern sun; and the Malik, having summoned all the chiefs of the army, sat down in a place which was found in front of the exalted throne, and every other officer found a place in the assembly according to his rank. The common people and servants assembled in a crowd. He then sent for the basiths of the Rai, and directed them to place their faces on the ground before the canopy, the shadow of God; and the elephants were placed in front of that assembly, to be exhibited for presentation...The Malik took the entire wealth of the Rai which was brought, and threatened a general massacre, if it should be found that the Rai had reserved anything for himself. An engagement was then entered into that the Rai should send jizya annually to Dehli. The Malik left Arangal on the l6th of Shawwal (March, 1310 A.D.) with all his booty, and a thousand camels groaned under the weight of the treasure. He arrived at Dehli on the 11th of Muharram, A.H. 710, and on Tuesday, the 24th, in an assembly of all the chiefs and nobles on the terrace of Nasiru-d din, the plunder was presented, and the Malik duly honoured...

“Three days after this, the king entered Jhain at midday and occupied the private apartment of the rai… He then visited the temples, which were ornamented with elaborate work in gold and silver. Next day he went again to the temples, and ordered their destruction, as well as of the fort, and set fire to the palace, and ‘thus made hell of paradise’… While the soldiers sought every opportunity of plundering, the Shah was engaged in burning the temples, and destroying the idols. There were two bronze idols of Brahma each of which weighed more than a thousand mans. These were broken into pieces and the fragments distributed amongst the officers, with orders to throw them down at the gates of the Masjid on their return.”65

“When he advanced from the capital of Karra, the Hindus, in alarm, descended into the earth like ants. He departed towards the garden of Behar to dye that soil with blood as red as tulip. He cleared the road to Ujjain of vile wretches, and created consternation in Bhilsan. When he effected his conquests in that country, he drew out of the river the idols which had been concealed in it.”66

Capture of Southern Mathra (Madura) After five days, the royal canopy moved from Birdhul on Thursday. the 17th of Zi-l ka’da, and arrived at Kham, and five days afterwards they arrived at the city Mathra (Madura), the dwelling-place of the brother of the Rai Sundar Pandya. They found the city empty, for the Rai had fled with the Ranis, but had left two or three elephants in the temple of Jagnar (jagganath). The elephants were captured and the temple burnt... When the Malik came to take a muster of his captured elephants they extended over a length of three parasangs, and amounted to five hundred and twelve, besides live thousand horses, Arabian and Syrian, and five hundred mans of jewels of every description-diamonds, pearls, emeralds, and rubies...

But sometimes neither the passage of time nor indeed death could remove the [racial] barriers. The remains of the Iranian Mir Murtaza Shirazi, who was earlier buried near the Indian Amir Khusrau, were ordered by Emperor Akbar “to be removed and buried elsewhere”, on the representation of Shaikh-ul-Islam, who pleaded that the two deceased would find each other’s company a torture.

Thanks to the perennial, well established convention of the world, the Hindu has all along been a game of the Turks. The relationship between the Turk and the Hindu cannot be described better than that the Turk is like a tiger and the Hindu, a deer. It has been a long established rule of the whirling sky that the Hindus exist for the sake of the Turk. Being triumphant over them, whenever the Turk chooses to make an inroad upon them, he catches them, buys them, and sells them at will. Since the Hindu happens to be a (wretched) slave in all respects, none need exercise force on his slave. It does not become one to scowl at a goat which is being reared for one’s meals. Why should one wield a sharp sword for one who will die by (just) a fierce look?

We find the Muslim historians going into raptures as they describe scenes of desecration and destruction. For Amîr Khusrû it was always an occasion to show off the power of his poetic imagination. When Jalãlu’d-Dîn Khaljî wrought havoc at Jhain, “A cry rose from the temples as if a second Mahmûd had taken birth”. The temples in the environs of Delhi were “bent in prayers” and “made to do prostration”, by Alãu’d-Dîn Khaljî. When the temple of Somnath was destroyed and its debris thrown into the sea towards the west, the poet rose to his full height. “So the temple of Somnãth,” he wrote, “was made to bow towards the Holy Mecca, and the temple lowered its head and jumped into the sea, so you may say that the building first said its prayers and then had a bath.” ... One wonders whether the poet of Islam is being honoured or slandered when he is presented in our own times as the pioneer of Secularism.

Because of the shortage of stone, people scurried hither and thither throughout the kingdom in search of it. Some struck the base of mountains, so much were they enamoured of their search for stone that they tore at the mountain like lovers. Some were keener than steel in up- rooting the foundations of unbelief. Having sharpened their steels they applied them in holy war to the idol temples of the rais and with blows of iron they devoted their strength with as much vigour as possible to the breaking of the stones. Wherever an idol temple had engaged in an act of devotion the strong tongue of the spade in well founded argument removed the foundations of infidelity from the heart so that, at once, that idol temple in gratitude performed the Muslim rite of bowing in prayer.

Amir Khusrau writes that under Jalauddin Khalji (1290-96), after a battle, “whatever live Hindu fell into the hands of the victorious king was pounded to bits under the feet of the elephants. The Musalman captives had their lives spared”.

After crossing those rivers, hills, and many depths, the Rai of Tilang sent twenty-three powerful elephants, for the royal service. For the space of twenty days the victorious army remained at that place, for the purpose of sending on the elephants, and they took a muster of the men present and absent, until the whole number was counted. And, according to the command of the king, they suspended swords from the standard poles, in order that the inhabitants of Ma’bar might be aware that the day of resurrection had arrived amongst them; and that [p. 92] all the burnt Hindus would be despatched by .the sword to their brothers in hell, so that fire, the improper object of their worship, might mete out proper punishment to them....The sea-resembling army moved swiftly, like a hurricane, to Ghurganw. Everywhere the accursed tree, that produced no religion, was found and torn up by the roots, and the people who were destroyed were like trunks, carried along in the torrent of the Jihun, or like straw tossed up and down in a whirlwind, and carried forward. When they reached the Tawi (Tapti), they saw a river like the sea. The army crossed it by a ford quicker than the hurricane they resembled, and afterwards employed itself in cutting down jungles and destroying gardens....

«« Allusions to water animals.” ‘The crocodiles of the water in their armies were waiting in ambush for the armour-backed fish. When they came upon them, with blows of their sharp arrows they caught them in fish trap. With the blows from the enemies’ maces and clubs on their tortoise-like armoured horses, they drew in their heads; the heads of the Hindus rolled like crocodiles’ eggs on the fish-backed earth. In an instant all those mermen had been drowned in blood and had fallen in the manner of fish already ritually pure. Those half killed by the spears or the arrows cried out like frogs when bitten by snakes.”