"This motive sanctified all his massacres and outrages in the eyes of his fellow-believers. Again, in 1569, when a noble named Husain Khan went on a private predatory expedition into the Sewalik mountains on ‘‘hearing that the bricks of the temples were of silver and gold, and conceiving a desire for this and all other unguarded treasures, of which he had heard a lying report,’’ the pious historian Al Badayuni (ii. 125) calls it a religious war. When Muhammad Adil Shah sent his armies to attack the Hindus of the Karnatak, whose only fault was their wealth, his Court historian designated this campaign of slaughter, rapine and outrage as the realization of a long cherished pious resolution. (Bas. Sal. 304.) The murder of infidels (kafir-kushi) is counted a merit in a Muslim. It is not necessary that he should tame his own passions or mortify his flesh; it is not necessary for him to grow a rich growth of spirituality. He has only to slay a certain class of his fellow-beings or plunder their lands and wealth, and this act in itself would raise his soul to heaven."

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Added on April 10, 2026
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