The Negative Theology of Nund Rishi (1378-1440): Poetry and Politics in Medieval Kashmir

Abstract

Nund Rishi, the founder of a regional Sufi Order called the Rishi Order in early fifteenth century Kashmir, is revered and remembered by most Kashmiris as Alamdār-i Kashmir (the flag-bearer of Kashmir) and also as Shaikh al-‘Ālam (the teacher of the worlds). Along with the fourteenth century Shaivite saint-poet, Lal Ded, he is one of the two most significant figures in the history of religion and literature in Kashmir. My dissertation is a detailed study of the mystical poetry of Nund Rishi. It explores the shruks (a form of Kashmiri mystical poetry exemplified by Nund Rishi) not only in its historical and political vicissitudes but also in relation to religious controversies and polemics in medieval Kashmir. Its most distinctive contribution in the process is that it locates Nund Rishi in relation to the traditions of negative theology that were prevalent in Islam and other religions in the region around the time (By ‘negative theology,’ I mean a discourse on the transcendent which relies on negations rather than affirmations). I examine the thinking of death, nothing, apocalyptic and Islam in Nund Rishi’s mystical poetry as a form of negative theology. These also organized his searing critique of the dominant political order in medieval Kashmir. The negative theology of Nund Rishi not only challenged political power in medieval Kashmir but also opened up the political to the demands of the subaltern. I argue that the negative theology of Nund Rishi, and its trajectory in Kashmiri poetry, must not only be read within the terms of religious studies— as one articulation among others of the ‘negative path’ across regions in the medieval Indo-Persian worlds. It should also be read as a singular and powerful literary discourse on the themes of death, nothing, apocalyptic and Islam; as a literary discourse which approaches the question of the political from the standpoint of an absent God.