Babur (1483-1530) was the founder of the Moghul Dynasty in India. The Baburnama is his autobiography written in Turki text. It follows, Babur's rule from Samarqand, through Kabul and other cities, and to India. In the work, Babur keeps track of time according to Muslim prayers and holidays and he discusses his practice of Islam with regard to such items as drinking/refraining from alcohol consumption.
Comments: 2/3/10
Babur was Muslim and as the passage below (p. 410) shows, he kept track of time according to the daily Islamic prayers and he celebrated Muslim festivals/holidays like Id-al-fitr, the festival at the end of Ramadan, the month of fasting. It also shows that he respected the rights of other people to express their religious devotion to Islam by not drinking.
(Sep. 25th) On Sunday the last day of the month (Ramazan), we marched from jui-shahi and dismounted at Qitiq-ariq (forty-conduits), I going by raft, with a special few. The new moon of the Feast was seen at that station. People had brought a few beast-loads of wine from Nur-valley; after the Evening Prayer there was a wine-party, those present being Muhibb-i-‘ali the armourer, Kwaja Muh. ‘Ali the librarian, Shah Beg’s Shah Hasan, Sl. Muh. Duldai and Darwish-i-muh. Sarban, then obedient (ta’ib). From my childhood up it had been my rule not to press wine on a non-drinker; Darwish-i-muhammad was at every party and no pressure was put on him (by me), but Khwaja Muh. ‘Ali left him no choice; he pressed him and pressed him till he made him drink.While Babur submitted to Islam, he was not fully obedient his entire life. He abstained from alcohol as a youth, even at the insistence of his father to drink. At the height of his rule, however, he succumbed to his sensual passions for wine and enjoyed many drinking parties. From pages 302-303:
They thought to make me also drink and to draw me into their own circle. Though up till then I had not committed the sin of wine-drinking and known the cheering sensation of comfortable drunkenness, I was inclined to drink wine and my heart was drawn to cross that stream (wada). I had had no inclination for wine in my childhood; I knew nothing of its cheer and pleasure. If, as sometimes, my father pressed wine on me, I excused myself; I did not commit the sin. After he died, Khwaja Qazi’s right guidance kept me guiltless; as at that time I abstained from forbidden viands, what room was there for the sin of wine? Later on when, with the young man’s lusts and at the prompting of sensual passion, desire for wine arose, there was no-one to press it on me, no-one indeed aware of my leaning towards it; so that, inclined for it though my heart was, it was difficult of myself to do such a thing, one hitherto undone. It crossed my mind now, when the Mirzas were so pressing and when too we were in a town so refined as Heri, “Where should I drink if not here where all the chattels and utensils of luxury and comfort are gathered and in use.” So saying to myself, I resolved to drink wine; I determined to cross that stream; …Later in life when his rule was ending he repented and abstained again from wine’s intoxication. From page 551:
On Monday the 23rd of the first Jumada (Feb 25th), when I went out riding, I reflected, as I rode, that the wish to cease from sin had been always in my mind, and that my forbidden acts had set lasting stain upon my heart. Said I, “Oh! my soul!”Descriptors: 1970s, B, book, historical, Kabul, literature, pre-Tsarist, Samarqand, translation, travel log
(Persian) “How long wilt thou draw savour from sin
Repentance is not without savour, taste it!”
