The Pîrs and Sayyids.
We now come to a more miscellaneous class—the Pîrs and Sayyids. Some of these we have encountered already. We have also seen instances of some holy men who, like Paul and Silas at Lystra, have been raised to the rank of deities. These saints are usually of Muhammadan origin, but most of them are worshipped indiscriminately both by Musalmâns and low class Hindus. The word Pîr properly means “an elder,” but according to Sûfi belief is the equivalent of Murshid, or “religious leader.” Sayyid, an Arabic word meaning “lord” or “prince,” is probably in many cases a corruption of Shahîd, “a martyr of the faith,” because many of these worthies owe their reputation to having lost their lives in the early struggles between Islâm and Hinduism. Mr. Ibbetson notes that he has seen a shrine of some Sayyids in the Jâlandhar District, who were said to have been Sikhs, who died in the front of the battle. It took the form of a Muhammadan tomb, lying east and west, surmounted by two small domes of Hindu shape with their openings to the south. Under each, in the face of the tomb, was a niche to receive a lamp.[50]
This and many other instances of the same kind illustrate in an admirable way the extreme receptivity of the popular belief. We have here a body of saints, many of whom were deadly enemies of the Hindu faith, who are now worshipped by Hindus. This is well put by Sir A. Lyall—“The ’Urs, or annual ceremony of these saints, like the martyr’s day of St. Edmund or St. Thomas of Canterbury, has degenerated into much that is mere carnal traffic and pagan idolatry, a scandal to the rigid Islâmite. Yet, if he uplifts his voice against such soul-destroying abuses, he may be hooted by loose-living Musalmâns as a Wahhâbi who denies the power of intercession, while the shopkeepers are no better than Ephesian goldsmiths in crying down an inconvenient religious reformer.”[51] And the same writer illustrates the fusion of the two creeds in their lower forms by the fact that the holy Hindu now in the flesh at Askot has only recently taken over the business, as it were, from a Muhammadan Faqîr, whose disciple he was during his life, and now that the Faqîr is dead, Narsinh Bâwa presides over the annual veneration of his slippers. Similarly at the Muharram celebration and at pilgrimages to tombs, like those of Ghâzi Miyân, a large number of the votaries are Hindus. In many towns the maintenance of these Muhammadan festivals mainly depends on the assistance of the Hindus, and it is only recently that the unfortunate concurrence of these exhibitions with special Hindu holidays has, it may be hoped only temporarily, interrupted the tolerant and kindly intercourse between the followers of the rival creeds.
In many of these shrines the actual or pretended relics of the deceased worthy are exhibited. Under the shadow of the Fort of Chunâr is the shrine of Shâh Qâsim Sulaimâni, of whom mention has been already made. The guardian of the shrine shows to pilgrims the turban of the saint, who was deified about three hundred years ago, and the conical cap of his supposed preceptor, the eminent Pîr Jahâniya Jahângasht; but, as in many such cases, the chronology is hopeless.
The Panj Pîr.
The most eminent of the Pîrs are, of course, the Panj Pîr, or five original saints of Islâm. They were—the Prophet Muhammad, ’Ali, his cousin-german and adopted son, Fâtima, the daughter of the Prophet and wife of ’Ali, and their sons, Hasan and Husain, whose tragical fate is commemorated with such ardent sympathy at the annual celebration of the Muharram.[52] But by modern Indian Muhammadans the name is usually applied to five leading saints—Bahâ-ud-dîn Zikariya of Multân, Shâh Ruqa-i-Âlam Hazrat of Lucknow, Shâh Shams Tabrîz of Multân, Shaikh Jalâl Makhdûm Jahâniyân Jahângasht of Uchcha in Multân, and Bâba Shaikh Farîd-ud-dîn Shakkarganj of Pâk Patan. Another enumeration gives the Châr Pîr or four great saints as ’Ali and his successors in saintship—Khwâja Hasan Basri, Khwâja Habîb ’Ajmi, ’Abdul Wâhid. Another list of Pîrs of Upper India gives their names as Ghâzi Miyân, Pîr Hathîlê, sister’s son of Ghâzi Miyân, Pîr Jalîl of Lucknow, and Pîr Muhammad of Jaunpur. It is, in fact, impossible to find a generally recognized catalogue of these worthies, and modern Islâm is no less subject to periodical change than other religions organized on a less rigid system.[53]