by sayyid ahmad barelWi (d. 1831). Other jurists,
however, ruled that as long as Muslims were
secure and allowed to fulfill their religious duties,
they could accept non-Muslim governments and
consider themselves to still be in the dar al-Islam.
With the end of the last Muslim empires and
the rise of new nation-states in the 20th century,
the concepts of the dar al-Islam and the dar al-harb
have been replaced by international laws, treaties,
and conventions governing relations between
states. Nonetheless, they still have their place in
the Islamic legal heritage, and they are invoked
from time to time in Muslim political rhetoric.
See also laW, international; politics and
islam; West aFrica.
Further reading: John Kelsay, Islam and War: A Study in
Comparative Ethics (Louisville, Ky.: Westminster/John
Knox Press, 1993); Majid Khadduri, War and Peace in
the Law of Islam (Washington, D.C.: Middle East Insti-
tute, 1955).
Dara Shikoh (Dara Shukoh, Dara
Shikuh) (1615–1659) Mughal prince known for
his writings on Sufism and liberal attitudes toward
other religions, especially Hinduism
Dara Shikoh was the first son of one of the most
powerful sovereigns of India’s mUghal dynasty,
Shah Jahan (r. 1628–58). In his aUtobiography,
Dara wrote that his father longed for an heir to
the throne and prayed that Sufi saint Muin al-
Din Chishti would fulfill his wish. The next year,
Queen Mumtaz Mahal gave birth to Dara near the
saint’s shrine in aJmer. Dara spent his early years
in the palace and then was assigned command of
an army when he was 17 years old. His father also
gave him administrative appointments and high
state honors to qualify him to be his successor and
avoid dynastic conflict. Nevertheless, when Shah
Jahan became ill in 1657, Dara and three younger
brothers, Muhammad Shuja, Murad, and aUrang-
zeb, engaged in a life-and-death struggle for their
father’s Peacock Throne. Aurangzeb and Murad
accused Dara of being an apostate because of his
involvement with Hindu yogis and ascetics. Never
very adept at war, Dara was defeated on the battle-
field, tried by the Ulama for apostasy, and executed
in 1659. Aurangzeb took the throne for himself
and did away with his remaining brothers.
Dara Shikoh, like his great-grandfather Akbar
(d. 1605), is usually placed within the liberal wing
of South Asian Islam, in juxtaposition to hard-
line religious conservatives such as his brother
Aurangzeb. His interest in religion first became
evident in 1640, when he was 25 years old. It
was at this time that he compiled a biographical
dictionary about mUhammad, the Prophet’s wives
and family, the first caliphs, the Shii imams, and
hundreds of Sufis, particularly those of the Qadiri,
Naqshbandi, Chishti, Kubrawi, and Suhrawardi
orders. During the same year, he and his older
sister, Jahanara (d. 1681), were initiated into the
Qadiri Sufi Order by Mullah Shah, a prominent
Sufi master who had been serving as their spiri-
tual guide. Dara wrote several books and tracts on
Sufi doctrine and practices, reflecting the stages of
his journey on the Sufi path. His most important
comparative work was Majmaa al-bahrayn (The
confluence of the two oceans), in which he sought
to prove that Islam and the Vedanta tradition in
Hindu religious thought shared the same essential
truths. For example, he equated the great names
of God in Islam with those given by Hindus to
their absolute cosmic being. He also identified the
Islamic idea of resurrection with Hindu notions
of liberation. Shortly before his death, Dara trans-
lated chapters of the Sanskrit philosophical com-
mentaries on the Vedas known as the Upanishads
into Persian. Indeed, it was through his transla-
tion, in which he had the assistance of Hindu
pandits and ascetics, that the Upanishads became
familiar to scholars of Indian language and litera-
ture in the West. Dara also was involved with the
translation of the Bhagavad Gita, the most well
known sacred text in the Hindu religion.
See also hindUism and islam; persian langUage
and literatUre; sUFism.Dara Shikoh 183 J