The structure of blessedness at a Muslim shrine in Pakistan

Abstract

In Pakistan and Muslim south Asia the shrines (mazar, dargah) of saints (pir, murshid) have been particularly important in the propagation of Islam. Previous ethnographic studies have generally concentrated upon the varied functions of such shrines. A popular view enunciated by Arnold (1961) is that shrines serve as specialized loci within which the particular and relatively mundane problems of visitors may be alleviated. For example, one such typical problem is illness, and as Pfleiderer (1981) illustrates in the case of Mira Data Dargah in Gujerat, the shrine may provide for varied curative and therapeutic routines. Other functions are also to be noted. Shrines encourage social participation; they provide entertainment in the form of devotional music and song (qawwali); they are educational; they allow for a redistribution of money, food, goods and services among living saints, followers, pilgrims, faqirs, vendors and beggars. And as control over such activities may become an issue, as for example in the case of the Dargah Sharif of Nizamuddin Auliya, the shrine may also function as an arena of competition, with public ceremonial providing the means for the expression of status rivalries (Jeffery, 1981). A shrine and the actions surrounding it may also be viewed in a broader societal context. Shrines may enable the formation of new social groups through the establishment of spiritual brotherhood (c.f., Mayer, 1967). Eaton (1978, 1983) investigating the constituencies of saints (e.g. Baba Farid Ganj-i-Shakar) finds that shrines, such as that at Pakpattan, may serve as regional centers of moral authority, exercising legitimacy over inter-ethnic and intra-societal relationships. Studies oriented toward historical socio-political issues have revealed how shrine management has expressed governmental policy for example, those of the Delhi Sultanate and British Colonial Government in the Punjab (c.f., Gilmartin, 1982, 1983) and how actions at shrines constitute and encode relationships between political and religious authorities (for example, Government of Pakistan officials at the shrine of Datta Ganj Baksh (cf., Ewing, 1978)). Shrines may serve all these functions in one or another circumstance. Yet in addition to viewing shrines in terms of the fulfilment of personal desires or the expression of socio-political dynamics, it would appear to be of more fundamental importance to consider the actions undertaken at shrines in their own right. While such actions may be performative, and while they may indeed have functions and be correlated with other issues, such actions themselves have a meaningful structure which requires ethnographic investigation. Three general strategies exist for pursuing such an investigation. The first is to treat the actions of those at a shrine as irrational and superstitious; to assume or 'conclude' that shrine participants are fooling themselves with