SHAH – Hybrid Learning

SHAH

Batoota — Sat, 29 Jul 2017 05:12:17 +0000

SHAH. One of the most common titles used by the dynastic rulers of Iran and the Turko-Persian cultural area, shah (Ar. and Pers., shah) when employed by the monarch of a large territory, is often used in a compound form such as padishah (“emperor”) or shahanshah (“king of kings”). However, it can also appear as part of the title of a regional authority (such as the Kabulshah or Sharvan-shah) or as part of a ruler’s personal name (Turanshah, Shah Jahan, etc.).
Philologists trace this word’s origin back to an Old Persian root, khshay (“to rule”), from which the Achaemenid kings (559-33 BCE) derived their title, khshayathiya. The subsequent forms shah and shahanshdh were routinely applied to the princes and kings of the Sassanian dynasty (224-651 CE). After the Arab conquest of Persia, the title fell into disuse except by a few petty provincial dynasts; the term shahanshah in particular acquired a pejorative connotation and was condemned in some hadiths as blasphemous. As the empire of the caliphs began to break up into provincial polities, some ambitious regional dynasts reportedly aspired to revive the imperial title of shdhdnshdh. The first Muslim rulers definitely known to have used it were the Buyids of western Iran (perhaps as early as 936), probably to emphasize their independence from the authority of the `Abbasid caliphs and later as a way of ranking authority within the Buyid family hierarchy. Thereafter, it became common for Muslim rulers to include shah as part of their titulature; it appears not only among Iranian dynasties, such as the Khwarazm-shahs but also among various Turko-Mongol rulers from the Seljuks to the Kara-koyunlu, Timurids, and Ottomans, as well as numerous Indian dynasties in Bengal, Kashmir, Jawnpur, Malwa, and elsewhere. However, such rulers generally used the term merely as one of many pompous and high-sounding titles without attaching any special significance to it. This was not the case with Isma’il Safavi, who took the title shah following the conquest of Tabriz and establishment of the Safavid dynasty in 1501. Shah once more became the particular and distinctive title of the dynastic rulers of the Iranian plateau, and it continued to be used in this sense not only by the Safavids but by virtually all the subsequent rulers of Iran. In 1925, Reza Khan, after having briefly flirted with the idea of establishing a republican form of government, also opted to assume the title shah.
The term shah is invariably translated into English as “king,” but this does not convey fully all its nuances. Like tsar or kaiser, the title is rich in historical associations and suggests an institution of great antiquity, legitimacy, power, and authority. In its original and most distinctive usage, it is closely linked to the Persian ideal of sacred kingship. The wish to capitalize on this concept of the shah as the possesor of an awesome “kingly glory” who must be respected and obeyed has doubtless been a major factor in the various revivals of the title. A recent and ill-fated example of this may be seen in Muhammad Reza Shah Pahlavi’s extreme glorification of the monarchy as the unifying force of the Iranian nation-state, a tradition which was brought to an abrupt end by the Islamic Revolution and the consequent abolition of the office in 1979.
[See also Iran; Monarchy.]
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Buchner, V. F. “Shah.” In Encyclopaedia of Islam, vol. 4, pp. 256257. Leiden, 1913-1938. Useful overview of the philological aspects of the term.
Dihkhuda, `All Akbar., “Shah.” In Lughatnamah. Tehran, 1947Lexicographical explication of the term with many references to its usage in literary sources.
Filipani-Ronconi, Pio. “The Tradition of Sacred Kingship in Iran.” In Iran under the Pahlavis, edited by George Lenczowski, pp. 5183. Stanford, Calif., 1978. Interesting interpretation of the concept of sacred kingship in Iranian history.
Madelung, Wilferd. “The Assumption of the Title Shahanshah by the Buyids and `The Reign of the Daylam (Dawlat al-Daylam).’ “Journal of Near Eastern Studies 28 (1969): 84-1o8, 168-183. Important article dealing with the usage of the title in early Islamic times.
ELTON L. DANIEL

ABBAS, SHAH

Batoota — Sun, 25 May 2014 10:47:38 +0000

Shāh ‘Abbās the Great (or Shāh ‘Abbās I) (Persian: شاه عَباس بُزُرگ‎) (27 January 1571 – 19 January 1629) was the 5th Safavid Shah (king) of Iran, and generally considered the greatest ruler of the Safavid dynasty. He was the third son of Shah Mohammad.
Shah Abbas I, the fifth ruler of the Safavid dynasty, ruled Iran from 1587 until 1629, the year of his death. Shah Abbas came to power at a time when tribal unrest and foreign invasion had greatly reduced Iran’s territory. Once on the throne he set out to regain the lands and authority that had been lost by his immediate successors. His defeat of the Uzbeks in the northeast and the peace he made with the Ottoman Empire, Iran’s archenemy, enabled Shah Abbas to reform Iran’s military and financial system. He diminished the military power of the
tribes by creating a standing army composed of slave soldiers who were loyal only to him. These so-called ghulams (military slaves) were mostly Armenians and Georgians captured during raids in the Caucasus. In order to increase the revenue needed for these reforms the shah centralized state control, which included the appointment of ghulams to high administrative positions. With the same intent he fostered trade by reestablishing
road security and by building many caravan series throughout the country. Under Shah Abbas, Isfahan became Iran’s capital and most important city, endowed with a new commercial and administrative center grouped around a splendid square that survives today. His genius further manifested itself in his military skills and his astute foreign policy. He halted the eastward expansion of the Ottomans, defeating them and taking Baghdad in 1623. To encourage trade and thus gain treasure, he welcomed European merchants to the
Persian Gulf. He also allowed Christian missionaries to settle in his country, hopeful that this might win him allies among European powers in his anti-Ottoman struggle. Famously down to earth, Shah Abbas was a pragmatic ruler who could be cruel as well as generous. Rare among Iranian kings, he is today remembered as a ruler who was concerned about his own people.
See also Empires: Safavid and Qajar.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Matthee, Rudolph P. The Politics of Trade in Safavid Iran: Silk
for Silver, 1600–1730. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University
Press, 1999.
Savory, Roger. Iran under the Safavids. Cambridge, U.K.:
Cambridge University Press, 1980.
Rudi Matthee

ABD AL-AZIZ, SHAH

Batoota — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 14:09:30 +0000

ABD AL-AZIZ, SHAH (1746-1824), Indian Islamic scholar. In northern India, `Abd al-`Aziz was a prominent Sufi `alim of his time, a powerful orator (khatib), an effective preacher (wa’iz), and an expert on hadith and the Qur’an. He left a deep imprint on Islamic learning through his writings and through the students who came to the Madrasah-i Rahimiyah from all overIndia. He was also a connoisseur of Indian vocal music and Urdu and Persian literature as well as an accomplished calligrapher and horseman.
At the age of sixteen, following the death of his father Shah Wali Allah (d. 1762), the foremost `alim of eighteenth-century India, Shah `Abd al-`Aziz assumed responsibility for administering and teaching at the madrasah, which had been founded by his grandfather. Author of twenty-two known works, `Abd al-Aziz wrote on topics ranging from Islamic philosophy, hadith, tafsir, and the spirit of Sunnism to rhetoric, genealogy, music, and Persian literary styles. In the Qur’anic studies, his Fath al-`Aziz (translation and exegesis of the first two chapters and the last two parts of the Qur’an in Persian, in 3 volumes) is a major contribution in its methodological framework and interpretation. He witnessed the disintegration of the social and political order, the transfer of political power into Shi`i hands (and the subsequent ascendancy of Shiism in northernIndia), and the British takeover of Delhi in 1803. Against this backdrop, his other two important Persian works Malfuzat-i `Azizi and Fatawd-i `Azizi, along with Fath al-Aziz, serve as comprehensive sources for religious and social reconstruction. They reflect the concerns of the Muslim community in a period of transition and expound his views on how to deal with such issues as the legal status of India under British rule, social intercourse with the British, the adoption of Western dress, learning English and joining the British service, interest on loans or deposits under British rule, the marriage of Muslim women with Christians, Shi`i-Sunni intermarriage, abortion, and the use of contraceptives.
`Abd al `Aziz’s major preoccupation, however, was to restore the superiority of Sunnism by refuting aspects of Shiism. Although he wrote several epistles on aspects of Shiism, his most comprehensive and controversial work was Tuhfah-i isna’ `ashariyah, completed in 1789-1790. His concern with the “right religion”-explaining beliefs and rituals and correcting misconceptions of historical realities such as the caliphate of the first three caliphs-may be seen as an attempt to preserve the Sunnis’ social identity in the changing sociopolitical order. `Abd al-`Aziz accepted Shiism as an important sect of Islam but rejected some Shi’i practices.
`Abd al-`Aziz did not assume any title that might suggest that God had designated him for a specific role in the community. His contemporaries and posterity, however, bestowed upon him such titles as siraj al-Hind (lamp of India) and muh addith (expert on hadith). Posterity acknowledged `Abd al-`Aziz’s erudition and placed him in the ranks of religious reformers (Sayyid Abu al-Ala Mawdudi, Tajdid va ihya’-i din, Lahore, 1966, pp. 114-115). Among `Abd al-`Aziz’s writings, the Tuhfah (also translated into Arabic and Urdu) should be singled out for its lasting impact. This work not only demonstrates his profound knowledge and understanding of authentic sources of the Shi`i and Sunni law but also epitomizes the linear development of sectarian polemics written by Sunni `ulama’ in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. His contemporaries among the Shi’i `ulama’ in the state of Awadh vehemently refuted each chapter of the Tuhfah. In the wake of sectarian strife and polemical discussions inPakistanin the early I990s, the Sunni `ulama’ have often referred to the Tuhfah as a source.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Mushir-ul-Haq. “Shah `Abd al-`Aziz al-Dihlawi and His Times.” Hamdard Islamicus 7.1-2 (1984): 51-96, .7.7-103. Insightful overview of `Abd al-`Aziz’s response to the Muslim community’s specific concerns over social and political problems.
Rizvi, S. A. A. Shah `Abd al-`Aziz: Puritanism, Sectarian, Polemics, and jihad.Canberra, 1982. Comprehensive study of Shah `Abd al`Aziz’s thought and of polemical discussions between Shi’i and Sunni `ulama’ inIndiafrom a Shi`i perspective.
SAJIDA SULTANA ALVI