1640-41)...

1640-41), during his stay, is said to have been attracted to Indian Yogic practices and to have written Muntakhab Jog , an anthology of Yoga Vashishtha . He also wrote Usui al-fusul , a treatise on Hinduism which unfortunately does not survive.

He was the most notable intellectual link between the tradition of Islamic philosophy of Iran and the movement for the translation of Sanskrit texts into Persian in India.26 The legacy of the ma'qulat (reason) favoured during the reign of Akbar was carried forward by such noted scholars as Abdus Salam Lahori, Abdus Salam Dewi, Shaikh Daniyal Chaurasi and ultimately Mulla Qutbuddin Sihalawi, the father of Mulla Nizamuddin, the first rector of the Farangi Mahal seminary.27 Another rationalist scholar in the Mughal court was Mulla Shafi'ai Yazdi Danishmand Khan, the employer of the famous Francois Bernier.

The hikmat traditions as they developed in Iran appear to have secured easy acceptance in the Mughal Empire during the reign of Shahjahan. An example can be given of Mulla Mahmud Faruqi of Jaunpur, a peripatetic scholar who had been a student of Mir Damad at Shiraz. He was not only invited to the Mughal court but counted Prince Shah Shuja and Shaista Khan amongst his pupils.28 A contemporary of Mulla Sadra, he joined the Mughal court in 1640.

Very soon, we find him taking part in a debate with Mulla Abdul Hakim Siyalkoti, a scholar who had written a number of glosses and commentaries on the works of Mulla Sharif Juzjani, Sa'duddin Taftazani and Mulla Jalaluddin Dawwani.29 The author of Dabistan-i Mazahib (c. 1653), during the same reign, records the names of two scholars who had obtained training in the philosophical traditions of Iran.

Hakim Dastur of Isfahan received training under 'Mir Baqir Damad, Shaikh Bahauddin Muhammad Mir Abul Qasim Findiriski and other such scholars of Shiraz'.30 Another was Hakim Kamran who, he says, was addressed by Mir Findiriski as 'brother'.31 Settled in the regions of Lahore and Agra respectively these scholars might have also come into contact with Sadra' s views which were creating a stir during the same period in Shiraz.