Waris Shah and society

Oceans of ink have been spilled writing about the jurisprudence concerning Sharia and the Holy Quran, but the mystic traditions of Sufism native to South Asia have been relegated to an apolitical and purely spiritual role. However, one should not be mistaken; the Waris and Bulleh Shahs of the Indian subcontinent were fierce revolutionaries, who did not purport, in their life or writings, that hermetic anarchism was their solution to the injustices of their society. Rather, their lives and writings reflected a political motivation of dismantling patriarchal authoritarianism and they offer valuable lessons for law today; the best example is perhaps Waris Shah’s telling of the Heer Ranjha story.

Though this story has been told by mystics and folklorists alike for many generations, Waris Shah’s version turned a Romeo and Juliet narrative into a politicised attack on the ills of his society, most of which still apply today. First, he attacks the class system by having Ranjha, a young man from an elite family transform himself into a ‘lowly sheepherder’ as a ploy to remain near his beloved. Her parents forbid their marriage simply based on the appearance of Ranjha as a commoner or proletariat. Waris Shah highlights the farcical nature of class with this part of the story, decrying society’s appreciation for trappings of wealth and highlighting the issue of egalitarianism and equality, which underlies all progressive law.

Then, Waris Shah turns to the institution of marriage itself, which was and is still used as an arranged business deal between families, having little to do with personal choice between the two parties involved. Waris Shah does not deride the institution of marriage, as the hero of his story has a desire to be married to Heer. At one point, when all seems lost, Heer asks Ranjha to run away from the society which won’t allow them to be together. Ranjha’s response tells us that neither Waris Shah nor his hero are anarchists or hermits. Ranjha responds that running away would mean they are admitting guilt, when they have nothing to feel guilty for. The hero of Waris Shah’s story does not wish to run from society, but to transform it in a revolutionary way.

Out of this discussion of the right to freely marry comes the conflict between the society Waris Shah and other Sufi poets wanted and the society that they lived in. The society of their time limited the freedoms of individuals with authoritarian structures, whether class, feudal or familial based. At the time Waris Shah was challenging his society’s structures with a spiritual vernacular, the French and Americans were challenging their monarchical authority with a political vernacular of revolution and democratic freedom. The aim of both was the same: to bring about a new society that valued the natural rights of the individual, whether it comes to their democratic representation or their basic right to marry whom they love.

However, it is not just the clans that Waris Shah wished to remove from power but also those clerics who use religion for their own ends. Waris Shah believed that a governing structure like a mosque should concern itself with the welfare of its congregants, which could be extrapolated as the duty of a state to ensure the welfare of its citizens, especially those in need.

At the same time as rejecting the religious power structure that is manipulated by some for their own ends, Waris Shah also critiques the hermetic jogi philosophy. On his path to be with his beloved, Ranjha trains to become an aesthetic jogi, and his teacher emphasises the importance of removing himself from a social structure dominated by desire. At the end of his stint, Ranjha vehemently disagrees with the jogi, claiming that it is insufficient to remove oneself from society, but rather, one must attempt to transform that society itself.

This was a message for many Sufi poets from the Indian subcontinent. Though they did not take part in the monarchical politics of their era, they engaged in the revolutionary act of writing poetry that directly confronted the pillars of authoritarian control in that society. In that manner, if one were to modernise and reinterpret their writings concerning the need for religious harmony and openness amongst groups, they would likely advocate for the need to establish a secular governing state.

Of course, as with all poetry, there is great room for debate. But, there is an even greater need to discuss the relevance of the ideas posed by intellectuals like Baba Farid, Bulleh Shah or Waris Shah to the political and social problems that persist today. One cannot relegate these figures as wool-wearing aesthetics, who lived in the woods and did not care about society. On the contrary, these thinkers cared a great deal about the future of their societies and used spiritual language to attack the sociopolitical status quo of the time, whereby kings, clerics and patriarchs could suppress everyone’s rights to freedom. While the figures may have changed over time, authority and oppression persist, which requires us to study the native spiritual intellectuals of the subcontinent in a more political manner than before.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 10^th, 2014.

Like Opinion & Editorial on Facebook, follow @ETOpEd on Twitter to receive all updates on all our daily pieces.