ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the Akbar quote and its political, military, and ideological contexts. Slavery and discipleship were fused in military and social historical fact, particularly in eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century north India. The chapter focuses on the shared ground of slavery and discipleship, and describes the ways that slavery helps everyone better understand the relationship between guru and chela. It investigates the specific context of Akbar's opinion on the relationship between slavery and discipleship. The significance of discipleship stems from a key common denominator of both slavery and discipleship, namely, the social death and rebirth that resides at their respective hearts. The interstices of the slave's new social relations may be understood as 'marginal kinship', an indicator of the fact that the slave’s status in the 'family' group, howsoever defined, was secondary to the status of 'natural-born' children. This was a factor in the denunciations of slave-chelas by both Umraogiri and Aqila Begam in the early nineteenth century seems clear.
