Muslim Saints of South Asia: The eleventh to ... - blog blog blog

THE ASCETIC OF PAKPATTAN
known Persian mystic, the future eminent saint of Bengal, Jalaluddin
Tabrizi, and he inquired whether there were any Sufis in the town,
he was told about the Judge’s young son. Jalaluddin visited Farid,
bringing a pomegranate with him as a gift. The youth, who was
fasting, declined the refreshment, however from the pomegranate
one seed fell out, which he ate after ifţār, i.e. after breaking the fast.
As soon as the pomegranate seed touched his lips, he experienced his
first mystic enlightenment. Here it will be appropriate to recollect
the story of spiritual awakening of young Khwaja Mu‘inuddin, who
had tasted of the sesame seeds, presented to him by a majdhūb. For
several years Farid regretted that he did not eat the whole pomegranate
– in that case the experience undergone by him would have been more
pervasive. However, later Qutbuddin Bakhtiyar Kaki set him at rest,
explaining that only one seed contained the saint’s baraka and this
very seed fell to Farid’s lot (Hamid Qalandar 1959: 219–20). In the
course of time having enquired his own murīds, Shaikh Farid was
adamant that they should always eat the whole pomegranate offered
to them, so that, God forbid, they may not miss the sacred seed.
Having been educated until then at home, Farid, at the age of 18,
set off to Multan to continue his studies. This town in Punjab in the
thirteenth century had become a stronghold of the Suhrawardiyya
fraternity and was within the walāyat, i.e. the limits of spiritual
jurisdiction of the head of this order, Baha’uddin Zakariya Multani.
By a happy coincidence, usual for all the saints’ lives, Qutbuddin
Bakhtiyar Kaki, in the course of his journey from Central Asian Aush
to Delhi, arrived in Multan at the same time. His relations with the
head of the Suhrawardis were quite strained, and he was in a hurry
to leave the town as soon as possible. One brief meeting in the mosque
near the Sara’i Khalwa’i was enough to bind the teacher and the
disciple for life.
It is not particularly difficult to imagine the circumstances of this
bygone meeting, which took place in the same year, 1193, that the
founder of the Chishtiyya fraternity reached the limits of Delhi. A
youth, emaciated by fasts and with entangled hair, is sitting in a
corner of the mosque, reading the manual on Muslim law, Nāfa‘,
and looking askance at an older man wearing a travelling jubba and
a high felt cap of foreign style, from under which locks touched
with grey are hanging down. Having performed his prayers, the
stranger turns round and asks the youth what is he reading. ‘This is
Nāfa‘’, says the youth in a whisper, since a well-bred young man
is supposed to answer an elder’s question in a low voice and with
downcast eyes. ‘May there be benefit (naf‘) for you in its study’, says
86