THE RISE AND FALL OF THE MUGHAL EMPIREThe great advantage of the system—its largely automatic operation—
proved to be a most dangerous disadvantage as time went by. The stream
of silver which poured from Central America via Europe into India
changed the price level, and the conquest of new territories and the
absorption of their elites into the imperial ranking system led to an undue
expansion of this system at the very top of the hierarchy—the material
resources, however, did not expand in the same way. Nevertheless, the
Mughals continued with Akbar’s system as if nothing had happened. At
the most, some arbitrary corrections were made from time to time, such as
cutting down the size of the military contingent to be maintained by the
officers in order to cope with inflation. Such arbitrary corrections would
either lead to a weakening of military strength or an erosion of the
agrarian base or both. In Akbar’s day, however, the system worked well
and showed its best results. His treasury was filled with a regular revenue
income and the burden on the taxpayer was tolerable.
Akbar’s contribution to the moral consolidation of the empire was also
admirable, but there was some criticism, too. He combined a policy of
religious toleration with a cult of the ruler which was aimed at
institutionalising the Mughal charisma. His ideal was that of the just ruler for
which he found parallels in the Muslim concept of the mahdi as well as in the
Hindu idea of the legendary king, Rama. Mirroring the doctrine of royal
absolutism in the West, Akbar tried to find legitimation by divine grace. But
unlike the Hindu kings he did not want to be only an upholder of the eternal
law: he wanted to be a lawgiver in his own right. Akbar’s ideas were criticised
by his more orthodox Muslim contemporaries, whereas his Hindu subjects
could understand these notions much better. The ritual sovereignty of the
Indian king depended on his identification with a god, which is in keeping
with the Hindu ideas of the immanence and transcendence of the divine
spirit. The dualism of Muslim thought which juxtaposes the omnipotence of
Allah with the complete subjection (Islam) of man under the divine will is
incompatible with this approach. Only the mysticism of the Sufis was akin to
Akbar’s new ‘Belief in God’ (Din-i-Illahi). The promulgation of this new
belief and Akbar’s emphasis on the greeting Allahu Akbar (‘God is great’)—
which could also be understood as an allusion to his name—coupled with the
decree by which Akbar reserved to himself the final decision in matters of
faith, were all bound to provoke the resistance of the orthodox. In this way
he wanted to establish a synthesis of all religious ideas that appealed to him
and prevent sectarian strife as a supreme umpire. He openly opposed the
orthodox Islamic scholars (ulama) whom he castigated for their medieval
outlook. Akbar’s bold attempt at creating a new, tolerant religion died with
him; but the idea of a divine grace which was bestowed on the Mughal
dynasty and constituted its charisma remained alive. Even centuries later
some reflection of Akbar’s charismatic splendour still cast a halo on his
humblest descendant.