Indian Muslim Minorities and the 1857 Rebellion Read online

  Ilyse R. Morgenstein Fuerst is Assistant Professor of Religion at the

  University of Vermont. Her work has previously been published in peer-

  reviewed journals and her research deals with Islam in South Asia,

  historiography and the development of theories of religion. She received

  a Master of Theological Studies degree from Harvard Divinity School

  and a PhD in Islamic Studies from the University of North Carolina at

  Chapel Hill.

  “This important reading of the 1857 Indian Rebellion reveals the

  decisive role of European colonialism in defining Islam in terms of jihad.

  It is a fresh analysis, deeply informed by unsuspected historical sources,

  with striking implications for our understanding of religion. Highly

  recommended.”

  Carl W. Ernst, Kenan Distinguished Professor of Religious Studies,

  University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

  “Indian Muslim Minorities and the 1857 Rebellion is a brilliant contribution,

  and so much more. It deepens and advances our understanding of South

  Asian history, Islam, and colonial encounter, whilst helping us to consider

  the interconnections among these fields that have for far too long been

  considered in isolation from one another. It also announces the arrival of a

  major scholar in the field. Recommended with the utmost enthusiasm.”

  Omid Safi, Director, Duke Islamic Studies Center,

  Duke University

  INDIANMUSLIM

  MINORITIES

  AND THE 1857

  REBELLION

  Religion, Rebels, and Jihad

  ILYSE R. MORGENSTEIN FUERST

  Published in 2017 by

  I.B.Tauris & Co. Ltd

  London • New York

  www.ibtauris.com

  Copyright q 2017 Ilyse R. Morgenstein Fuerst

  The right of Ilyse R. Morgenstein Fuerst to be identified as the author of this work

  has been asserted by the author in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and

  Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or any part thereof,

  may not be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted,

  in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or

  otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  References to websites were correct at the time of writing.

  International Library of Colonial History 24

  ISBN: 978 1 78453 855 2

  eISBN: 978 1 78672 237 9

  ePDF: 978 1 78673 237 8

  A full CIP record for this book is available from the British Library

  A full CIP record is available from the Library of Congress

  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: available

  Typeset in Garamond Three by OKS Prepress Services, Chennai, India

  Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY

  for Kevin,

  my co-conspirator

  (in all the best ways)

  CONTENTS

  Acknowledgments

  ix

  A Note on Transliteration

  xii

  Introduction

  1

  Religion, Rebels, and Jihad

  4

  Theoretical Framing

  5

  A Note on Language

  8

  Chapter Outline

  10

  1.

  The Company, Religion, and Islam

  13

  Religion before Rebellion

  21

  “Watershed Moment”: the Great Rebellion

  25

  Greased Cartridges and Chapatis: the Anxiety of

  Religious Conspiracy

  30

  Muslim Memories of the Great Rebellion

  40

  Conclusions

  45

  2.

  Suspect Subjects: Hunter and the Making of a

  Muslim Minority

  49

  Bound to Rebel: Making Muslims a Minority

  52

  Indian Musalmans and Hunter: Author of Empire

  57

  Laws, Literalism, and All Muslims: Hunter’s Claims

  60

  Favorable Ruling, Unfavorable Interpretation

  73

  Conclusions

  82

  viii

  INDIAN MUSLIM MINORITIES AND THE 1857 REBELLION

  3.

  “God save me from my friends!”: Syed Ahmad Khan’s

  Review on Dr Hunter

  86

  Sir Syed on the Great Rebellion

  90

  An Academic Rejoinder to Indian Musalmans

  98

  A Legalism of His Own: Sir Syed on Hunter’s Use of

  Islamic Law

  102

  On Muslim Loyalty

  108

  On Literalism, Wahhabism, and Jihad

  111

  Conclusions

  117

  4.

  Rebellion as Jihad, Jihad as Religion

  123

  Defining Jihad

  126

  Making Muslims Jihadis

  132

  Jihad in Imperial India and the Great Rebellion

  137

  Conclusions

  146

  Conclusion

  Religion, Rebels, and Jihad: Legacies and

  Ongoing Impact

  149

  Epilogue

  1857 from Today’s Vermont

  157

  Notes

  163

  Bibliography

  199

  Index

  221

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I need to express my gratitude to those colleagues, friends, and family

  members whose various and divergent efforts have helped make this

  book.

  I have been fortunate enough to enjoy financial support for a bulk of

  this research as part of my start-up and professional development

  funding from the University of Vermont, the Small Grants Award

  through the College of Arts and Sciences, and the Peter J. Seybolt

  Faculty Fund in Asian Studies. Additionally, the American Academy of

  Religion’s Selva J. Raj Endowed International Dissertation Research

  Fellowship inadvertently sponsored both the research for the dissertation

  and this (wholly unrelated) book: while on a break from dissertation-

  related translating, I stumbled upon the writings of Hunter and Khan,

  and began the research that would turn into this project. Portions of

  this book have been presented previously in other forms: portions

  of Chapter 1 at the 2013 South Asian Literary Association Annual

  Conference in Boston, MA; Chapter 2 at a 2014 Religion Faculty

  colloquium in Burlington, VT; portions of Chapters 2 and 3 at the 2014

  5th Annual Islamophobia Conference in Berkeley, CA; and portions of

  Chapters 3 and 4 at both the 2015 American Academy of Religion

  Annual Meeting, Atlanta, GA and the 2016 Boston College Biennial

  History of Religion Conference in Boston, MA. The conversations at

  each conference pushed my work in new – and better – directions, and

  I am grateful for those opportunities for grow
th.

  Many who have guided and taught me over the years deserve

  much more than a few meager words of gratitude. Dr. Carl W. Ernst is an

  x

  INDIAN MUSLIM MINORITIES AND THE 1857 REBELLION

  invaluable mentor who has pushed me to think about “religion” and

  “Islam” as categories in need of constant re-thinking; I hope to do justice

  to his erudition but more importantly to his years of kind guidance and

  intellectual generosity. My first college professor, Dr. Omid Safi,

  initiated me into the study of Islam and he has since championed my

  work, often from the sidelines and without end. In other but equally

  important ways – through conversations, texts, and even tweets –

  Drs. Bruce B. Lawrence, Juliane Hammer, and Kecia Ali have

  openhandedly propelled me from afar as I completed this project. I am

  grateful to my Fall 2015 Islam and Modernity students, who read a draft

  of Chapter 3; I had thought I was sharing my work to actively model the

  revision process of research to help their writing projects, but it turned

  out they were helping me revise and hone my argument. I am indebted

  to my colleagues in the Religion Department at the University of

  Vermont, who have welcomed me warmly into our little house on Main

  Street, listened to me talk often about this project, and helped me to

  think deeply, sharply, and better.

  I am especially fortunate to have colleagues and friends willing to

  spend hours (and hours and hours) with my writing and ideas.

  Drs Brandi Denison and Kristian Petersen have offered critical feedback

  on a number of chapters and have my warmest appreciation. Dr. Gregory

  A. Lipton has read and commented on drafts of nearly every chapter,

  some in the very early stages of writing (which always deserves special

  recognition); while extremely humbled by his critical eye and unstinting

  reads, I am all the more grateful for our friendship. Dr. Kathleen Foody

  offered meaningful feedback on the conclusion and has been a constant

  conversation partner since 2007, for which I am ceaselessly elated. Dr.

  Megan Goodwin has read every single word of this book, offered

  bountiful (and often sidesplitting) marginalia, and helped me keep

  theoretical issues at the fore; her brilliance as a scholar is trumped only

  by her brilliance as a friend. Despite such a cherished and esteemed cadre

  of scholars in my margins, whatever errors remain are mine and mine

  alone.

  At I.B.Tauris I was well cared for and advised, first by Azmina

  Siddique and then by Thomas Stottor, and each offered top-notch

  support for this project, kind and timely guidance, and clarity. Similarly,

  I owe Jane Haxby, my copy editor, a tremendous debt of gratitude; her

  work on this manuscript was impeccable. Yet, support for writing is not

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  xi

  limited to the writing itself, of course. I owe much to Carolyn Lewis,

  who has offered tangible and deeply meaningful support to me in many

  ways for more than three years. I worked out more of my ideas than I

  ought to admit while working out at RevIndoor Cycling, so Sarah

  DeGray and her team have my appreciation. My family – Flo and Lloyd

  Morgenstein, Karly Morgenstein, and Deena Goodman – comprise

  the often invisible but omnipresent support network on which I will

  forever rely.

  I want to thank my spunky, smart, and spectacular daughter, Sela.

  She’s gone from incubation to infancy to toddlerhood during the research

  and writing of this project, and she is now able to ask, regularly, if my

  book is done yet so I can play pretend and be “less boring.” Finally, my

  husband Kevin has been a true co-conspirator, a colluding partner as we

  navigate our shared life. This book is dedicated to him for all the ways

  his loving encouragement makes my work – and daily existence –

  infinitely, almost unthinkably enhanced.

  A NOTE ON TRANSLITERATION

  Where appropriate for Islamicate languages, I have followed the

  transliteration style of the International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies

  (IJMES); the first time I use terms likely to be unfamiliar to readers,

  I have set them in italic, then in italic or roman according to IJMES

  usage thereafter. I have followed convention for other South Asian

  languages. I have not transliterated names of persons or places, and

  I have marked historical place-names in northern India alongside

  contemporary place-names when appropriate. I have marked technical

  vocabulary in italics. In order to preserve clarity and avoid clutter, this

  does not include, however, words that have become common in English

  (e.g., jihad); similarly, words that have become common in English-

  language usage are pluralized, when appropriate, following English

  convention rather than Islamicate linguistic norms (e.g., fatwas not

  fata¯wa¯). When quoting, I have maintained original spellings and

  transliterations as applicable. Because this is, in many ways, a book

  about definitions, most controversial terms will be defined historically,

  in context, and at length.

  INTRODUCTION

  Religion is not a thing to be trifled with, and the dullest and most

  phlegmatic will be roused to the boiling point of rage and

  enthusiasm when it once is affected.

  – Causes of the Indian Revolt, by a Hindu Bengali,

  ed. Malcolm Lewin1

  On May 9, 1857, soldiers serving in the third regiment of light cavalry

  in the Meerut cantonment awaited imprisonment for failing to use

  their weapons properly. The newest Lee-Enfield rifles required soldiers

  (sepoys) to bite the cartridge, but the sepoys refused – they had heard

  the rumors about these new rifles and they were incensed. The cartridges

  were greased with lard and tallow, offending the religious sensibilities of

  Muslims and Hindus, respectively. After months of growing unrest,

  dissatisfaction among sepoys and disquiet among civilians, rumors of a

  new rifle sparked the match that lit a flame of mutiny and rebellion.

  On May 10, 1857, as the sepoys of the third regiment faced sentencing,

  sepoys in other regimens broke rank to liberate their imprisoned

  compatriots. Meerut boasted an equivalence of Indian and British

  soldiers, approximately 2,357 Indian sepoys to 2,038 British soldiers;

  this was a fierce and bloody attack – but the violence was not cordoned

  off to the garrisoned walls. Meerut’s civilians were not spared. Some

  20 British civilians, including women and children, were massacred;

  additionally, some 50 Indian civilians perished in the rebellion’s first

  outbreak. Many sepoys who began the mutiny fled the 40 miles to

  garrisoned and protected Delhi during the night, and on May 11, Delhi,

  2

  INDIAN MUSLIM MINORITIES AND THE 1857 REBELLION

  too, witnessed rebellion. Britons – soldiers and civilians – were taken

  prisoner and many were executed on May 16, 1857. The week in mid-

  May began a long, terrifying year of bloodshed, rebellion, suppression,

  and suspicion.

  This long year marked – and continues to mark – one of the most

  importan
t moments in South Asian and British history alike. Scholars of

  South Asia have amply critiqued such Euro-American historiographies

  that elided lesser-known examples of resistance to colonial authority. 2

  Yet, the centrality of 1857 remains in both Euro-American and South

  Asian historiographies. One might suggest this is precisely due to the

  power accorded the initial weight afforded the Rebellion: to suggest it

  lacks importance or centrality would be a post-colonial resistance to an

  ongoing Euro-American hegemony. However, one might also suggest

  that the brutality and scope of the Great Rebellion indicates its position

  as essential and essentially climactic. The events of the Great Rebellion

  and its component parts – the initial sepoy involvement, its spread to

  civilians, its multiple massacres on both sides, the years of famine and

  deaths that followed, and the brutal ways in which the British regime

  sought to put down any hint of rebellion in its wake – are no doubt

  enormously significant in size, scope, and its lasting imprint on

  British and South Asian popular history and imagination. Despite its

  overvaluation as the example of (ultimately quashed) Indian resistance to

  British rule, the Great Rebellion is undeniably an exemplar of resistance,

  and moreover, an indelible set of events which fundamentally altered the

  ways in which India was ruled and how Britons saw the people and

  landscape that they ruled. There can be no doubt that 1857 marks –

  perhaps scars – the history and historiography of South Asia.

  There is also little doubt that the massive imperial reconfiguration

  and response to Rebellion fundamentally alters definitions of religion.

  No scholar of religion and its study can afford to ignore South Asia: not

  only have so many of the field’s founding thinkers based their theories

  on Indic languages, literatures, and racial-linguistic definitions, but as

  Peter Gottschalk has thoroughly established, the ways in which the

  British categorized religion in India fundamentally alter how religion

  is thought about, as a category, well beyond British rule and Indian

  borders (issues discussed at length in Chapter 1). More topically,

  however, neither can one ignore how the Great Rebellion seismically

  reconfigured the ways in which both religion and particular religions are

  INTRODUCTION

  3

  defined, characterized, and classified. In other words, 1857 marks not

  only South Asian and British histories, but the history of the study of