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IRAN
AND THE WORLD IN THE SAFAVID AGE
Abstracts
Morton, Mr. Alexander, Independent Scholar, London, Maulana Ahmad Pakaraji and the Origins of Anti-Safavid
Polemic
Polemic
against the Safavids has mainly been studied from sources, which
date from after the establishment of the Safavid state, were
produced in territories under the rule of the Ottomans and Uzbeks
and reflect the inter-state rivalries of the sixteenth century.
Maulana Ahmad Pakaraji is the most important representative of an
earlier stage of condemnation of the Safavid movement, inspired
rather by contemporary knowledge of the conduct of the followers
of the new doctrines associated with the Safavid Shaikh Junaid.
Pakaraji's short essay in Arabic condemning the Ardabili Sufis as
infidels was written in A.H. 884 (A.D. 1479-80). It is the
earliest known such attack on the Safavids, but both it and its
author have been almost entirely overlooked.
Long before, in 861 (1457), Pakaraji's testimony had played
a part in the expulsion of Junaid from Syria. A Hanafi jurist
coming from the neighbourhood of Erzincan, he had some connection
with Aleppo, but was mainly active in Aqquyunlu lands and
evidently enjoyed the confidence of Uzun Hasan, who consulted him
and employed him on diplomatic missions over a long period.
Pakaraji and his views on the Ardabilis were known to some of the
anti-Safavid polemicists writing under the Ottomans in the
sixteenth century, but these later writings on the subject, while
generally concurring with, or even repeating, his presentation of
the ibahat of the Ardabilis and their heretical belief in the
immortal nature of their leader, present further charges in
keeping with later developments within Safavid Iran and influenced
by Ottoman policy towards it.
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