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Hindu-Sikh
Relationship PART 1 TO 5
Sikhs have always been
honoured members of Hindu society.
Hindus at large have always cherished the legacy left by the
Gurus and venerated Sikh Gurudwaras no less than the shrines of
any other Hindu sect. There has never been any bar on inter-
marriage, inter-dining and many other modes of inter-mingling
between the parent Hindu society on the one hand and the Sikh
community on the other. Hindus and Sikhs share a common cultural
heritage and a common historical consciousness of persecutions
suffered and freedom struggles fought.
Sikh Spirituality
The Sikh sect was founded by Guru Nanak Dev ( 1469-1538 A.D.)
and promoted further by nine other Gurus, the last of whom,
Govind Singh (b. 1675), died in 1708 A.D. GuruNanak came from a
Vaishnava family in that part of the Punjab which went to pakis-
tan after the partition in 1947. He was born at a time when the
sword of Islamic invaders had already swept over the length and
breadth of India and done immeasurable damage not only to the
shrines and symbols of Hinduism but also to the self-confidence
of Hindus. The Punjab alongwith North-West Frontier and Sindh
had suffered more heavily than elsewhere. Many Hindus in these
provinces had been converted to Islam by force. The rest had
been reduced to second class citizens who could not practise
their religion publicly without inviting persecution at the
hands of Muslim theologians and tyrants.
It was in this atmosphere that Guru Nank asserted the su-
periority of his ancestral spirituality as against Islamic
monotheism which had divided mankind into hostile camps and set
children of the same Divinity at each other's throats. This was
an act of great courage because Islam prescribed the penalty of
death for anyone who said that Hinduism was a religion as good
as Islam, not to speak of saying that Hinduism was superior.
Many Hindus had been put to death for uttering such a
"blasphemy.
What Guru Nanak had Proclaimed was, however, a part of the
Hindu response to the Islamic conslaught. The response was two-
pronged. While Hindu warriors fought against Islamic invaders
on many a battlefield all over the country, Hindu saints
and sages created a country-wide spiritual upsurge which
came to be known as the Bhakti Movement. The message of this
Movement was the same every- where, based as it was on the Ve-
das, the Ithihasa Purana and the Dharma-Shastras. The only vari-
ation on the central theme was that while most schools of
Bhakti deepened the spirit behind outer forms of worship, some
others laid greater emphasis on advaitic mysticism as ex-
pounded in the Upanishads and the various traditions of Yoga.
The latter schools alone could flourish in the Punjab and the
rest of the North-West which had been denuded of Hindu temples
and where ritual Practices were forbidden by the Muslim rulers.
It was natural for Guru Nanak to be drawn towards this school in
the course of his spiritual seeking and sing its typical
strains in his own local language.
The Bhakti Movement produced many saints in different parts
of the country, North and South, East and West. They spoke and
sang in several languages and idioms suited to several regions.
It was inevitable that their message should go forth from as many
seats and centres. Guru Nanak established one such seat in the
Punjab. Those who responded to his call became known as Sikhs
(Sk. Shisyas, desciples ). The fourth Guru, Ram Das (1574-1581
A.D. ), excavated a tank which subsequently became known as
Amrit- sar (pool of nectar) and gave its name to the city
that grew around it. In due course, a splendid edifice, Hari-
mandir (temple of Hari), rose in the middle of this tank and be-
came the supreme centre of the Sikh sect. Its sanctum sanc-
torum came to house the Adi Granth confining compositions of Sikh
Gurus and a score of other Hindu saints from different parts
of the country. The songs of a few Muslim sufis who had been
influenced by advaita were also included in it. The compila-
tion of the Adi Granth was started by the fifth Guru, Arjun
Dev(1581 - 1606 A.D.), and com- pleted by the tenth Guru, Govind
Singh.
Hindu-Sikh Relationship (part 2/10)
-----------------------------------
There is not a single line in the Adi Granth which sounds
discordant with the spirituality of Hinduism. All strands of
Hinduism may not be reflected in Sikhism. But there is nothing in
Sikhism, its diction, its imagery, its idiom, its cosmogony, its
mythology, its stories of saints and sages and heroes, its meta-
physics, its ethics, its methods of meditation, its rituals -
which is not derived from the scriptures of Hinduism. Ragas
to which the hymns and songs of the Adi Granth were set by
the Gurus are based on classical Hindu music. Parikrama ( Peram-
bulation ) performed by Sikhs round every Gurudwara, the
dhoop(incense), deep(lamp), naivaidya(offerings) presented by the
devotees inside every Sikh shrine, and the prasadam (sanctified
food) distributed by Sikh priests resemble similar rites in every
other Hindu place of worship. A dip in the tank attached to the
Harimandir is regarded as holy by Hindus and Sikhs in particular
as a dip in the Ganga.
It is this sharing of a common spirituality which has led
many Hindus to worship at Sikh Gurudwaras as if they were their
own temples. Hindus in the Punjab regard the Adi Granth as the
sixth Veda, in direct succession to the Rik, the Sama, the
Yajus, the Atharva and the Mahabharata. A Hindu does not have to
be a Sikh in order to do homage to the Adi Granth and participate
in Sikh religious rites. Similarly, till recently Sikhs
visited temples of various other Hindu sects, went to Hindu
places of Pilgrimage and cherished the cow together with many
other symbols of Hinduism. Religion has never been a cause
of conflict between Sikh and non-Sikh Hindus.
Sikh History Guru Nanak's message came like a breath of fresh
breeze to Hindus in the Punjab who had been lying prostrate under
Muslim oppression for well over five centuries. They flocked
to the feet of the Sikh Gurus and many of them became initiated
in the Sikh sect. The sect continued to grow till it spread
to several parts of the Punjab, Sindh and the North-West Frontier.
Gurudwaras sprang up in many places. The non-Sikh Hindus
whose temples had been destroyed by the Muslims installed the
images of their own gods and goddesses in many Sikh Gurudwaras.
The Hindu temples which had survived welcomed the Adi Granth in
their precincts. In due course, these places became community
centers for Hindu society as a whole.
This resurgenee of India's indigenous spirituality could not
but disturb Muslim theologians who saw in it a menace to the
further spread of Islam. The menace looked all the more serious
because Sikhism was drawing back to the Hindu fold some converts
on who Islam had sat lightly. The theologians raised a hue and
cry which caught the ears of the fourth Mughal emperor, Jahangir
(1605-1627 A.D.), who had ascended the throne with the assistance
of a fanatic Islamic faction. He martyred the fifth Sikh Guru,
Arjun Dev, for "spreading falsehood and tempting Muslims to
apostay."
Hindus everywhere mourned over the foul deed, while Muslim
theologians thanked Allah for his "mercy." Guru Arjun
Dev was
the first martyr in Sikh history. Muslim rulers continued to
shed Sikh blood till Muslim power was destroyed by resurgent Hindu
heroism in the second half of the 18th Century.
The sixth Sikh Guru Har Govind (1606-1644 A.D.), took up
arms and trained a small army to resist Muslim bigotry. He was
successful and Sikhs escaped persecution till the time of the
sixth Mughal emperor. Aurangzeb ( 1658-1707 A.D. ), who was a
veritable fiend in a human form so far as Hindus were concerned.
He summoned the ninth Sikh Guru, Tegh Bahadur (1664-1675 A.D.),
to the imperial seat at Delhi and marryred him in cold blood on
his refusal to embrace Islam. Some followers of the Guru who
had accompained him were subjected to inhuman torture and torn to
pieces. This was as it were a final signal that there was some-
thing very hard at the heart of Islam - a heart which the Gurus
had tried to soften with their teachings of humanism and univer-
salism. Sikhism had to accept the challenge and pick up the sword
in defence of its very existence.
Hindu-Sikh Relationship (part 3/10)
-----------------------------------
This transformation of Sikhism had been started already,
though in a small way, by Guru Har Govind. The tenth Guru,
Govind Singh, completed the process when he founded the Khalsa
(Party of the Pure) in 1699 A.D. He was a versatile scholar
who knew several languages, kept the company of learned Brahmins
and composed excellent poetry on varied themes. He had been
had been fascinated by the Puranic story of Goddess Durga,
particularly in her incarnation as Mahisasuramardini. He performed
an elaborate Yajna presided over by pandits of the ancient lore
and invoked the Devi for the protection of dharma. The Devi
came to him in the shape of the sword which he now asked some of
his followers to pick up and ply against bigotry and oppression.
Those who could muster the courage and dedication to die
in defence of dharma were in- vited by him to become members of
the Khalsa by wearing the five emblems of this heroic order--Kesh
(unshorn hair) Kangha (comb), Kada (steel bracelet), Kachha
(shorts) and Kirpan (sword). A new style of initiation termed
pahul was ordained for this new class of Sikh warriors--sipping
a palmful of water sweetened with sugar and stirred by a double-
edged sword. Every member of the Khalsa had to add the honorofic
Singh (lion) to his name so that he may be distinguished
from the non-Khalsa Sikhs who could continue with their normal
attire and nomenclature. No distinction of caste or social
status was to be recognised in the ranks of the Khalsa.
The Khalsa was not a new religious sect. It was only a martial
formation within the larger Sikh fraternity,, as the Sikhs
themselves were only a sect within the larger Hindu society. It
was started with the specific mission of fighting against Muslim
iryranny and restoring freedom for the Hindus in their ancestral
homeland. Soon it became a hallowed tradition in many Hindu
families, Sikh as well non-Sikh, to dedicate their eldest sons to
the Khalsa which rightly came 'to be regarded as the sword-arm
of Hindu society.'
Guru Govind Singh was forced to fight against a whole
Musiim army before they could consolidate the Khalsa. His
two teen-aged sons courted matyrdom along with many other
members of the Khalsa in a running battle with a fully equipped
force in hot pursuit. His two other sons who were mere boys were
captured and walled up alive by the orders of a Muslim governor
after they refused to embrace Islam. The Guru himself had to
go into hiding and wander from place to place till he reached
Nanded town in far-off Maharashtra. He was murdered by a Muslim
fanatic to whom he had granted an interview inside his own tent.
But the mighty seed he had planted in the shape of the Khalsa
was soon to sprout, grow speedily and attain to the full
stature of a strong and well-spread-out tree.
Before he died, Guru Govind Singh had commissioned Banda
Bairagi, a Rajput from Jammu to go to the Punjab and punish the
wrong-doers. Banda more than fulfiled his mission. He was
joined by fresh formations of the Khalsa and the Hindus at large
gave him succour and support. He roamed all over the Punjab,
defeating one Muslim army after another in frontal fights as well
as in guerilla warfare. Sirhind, where Guru Govind Singh's
younger sons had been walled up, was stormed and sacked. The
bullies of Islam who had walked with immense swagger till only
the other day had to run for cover. Large parts of the Punjab
were liberated from Muslim depotism after a spell of nearly
seven centuries.
The Mughal empire, however, was still a mighty edifice which
could mobilize a military force far beyond Banda's capacity to
match. Gradually, he had to yield ground and accept defeat as
his own following thinned down in battle after battle. He was
captured, carried to Delhi in an iron cage and tortured to death
in 1716 A.D. Many other members of the Khalsa met the same fate
in Delhi and elsewhere. The Muslim governor of the Punjab had
placed a prize on every Khalsa head. The ranks of the Khalsa had
perforce to suffer a steep decline and go into hiding.
Hindu-Sikh Relationship
(part 4/10)
-----------------------------------
The next upsurge of the Khalsa came in the second half of the
Century. The Marathas had meanwhile broken the back of
Mughal power all over India and the Mughal administration in the
Punjab had distintegrated speedily. A new Muslim invader, Ahmad
Shah Abdali, who tried to salvage the Muslim rule, had to give up
after several attempts from 1748 to 1767 A.D. His only
satisfaction
was that he demolished the Harimandir and desecrated the
sacred tank with the blood of slaughtered cows, two times in a
row.
But the Sikh and non-Sikh Hindus rallied round the Khalsa again
and again and rebuilt the temple every time.
The Khalsa had a field day when Abdali departed finally from the
scene. By the end of the century, Muslim power evaporated all
over the Punjab and several Sikh principalities came up in
different parts of the province. The strongest of them was that of
Maharaja Ranjit Singh (1783-1839 A.D ) who wiped out the Muslim
rule from Kashmir and the North West Frontier as well. He would
have conquered Sindh and Afghanistan also but for the steam-
roller of British imperialism which took over his farflung
kingdom as well, soon after his death.
The British had conquered India through their superiority in
the art of warfare. They could not hope to hold such a big
country by means of military might alone. They had to devise
policies of devide any rule. The residues of Islamic imperialism
had become their allies quite early in course of the conquest.
Now they had to contend with the national society constituted by
Hindus. It became the main plank of their policy, therefore, to
fragment Hindu society and pit the pieces against each other. At
the same time, they tried to create pockets of solid support for
their regime in India. One such pocket was provided by Sikhs.
The British planned and put into operation a move to separate
and seal off the Sikh community from its parent Hindu society by
converting it into a distinct religious minority like the Muslims
and the Christians. Tutored Sikh theolgians and scholars were
patronised to make them pronounce that Sikhism was a decisive
departure from Hinduism, the same as Christianity was from
Judaism. The labours of Christian missionaries and the timings of
Western Indology were mobilized in order to achieve this end.
Hindu-Sikh Relationship (part 5/10)
-----------------------------------
Christian missionaries had discovered quite early in their
evangelical endeavours that the strength of Hindu society and
culture lay ultimately in the mainstream of Hindu spirituality as
expounded in the Vedas, the Puranas and the Dharmashastras. It
was this spirituality which had served Hindu society in meeting
and defeating several foreign invaders. The missionaries had,
therefore, subjected this spirituality to a sustained attack by
misnaming it as Brahminism and misrepresenting it as a system of
Polytheistie and idolatorous Paganism leading to sin in this
world and perdition in the next.
At a later stage, Western Indologists had joined forces with
Christian missionaries, sometimes inadvertently due to their
ignorance of Indian culture and sometimes deliberately due to
mischievous political motives. According to the "scientific
studies" carried out by the Indologists,'Brahmanism was an
alien imposition on India brought in by "Aryan invaders"
who had
driven the "native Dravidians" to the South around 1500
B.C.
Their "higher criticism" had "revealed" that
the core Brahminism
consisted of "primitive animism, puerile priestcraft and
caste
oppression of the enslaved aborigines.- They Presented Buddhism
and Jainism as "revolts" against the social system
created by
Brahminism. The "revolt" was stated to have been
continued and
carried forward by some schools of the medieval Bhakti Movement
of which Sikhism was supposed to be the foremost.
It was now relatively easy for some Sikh theologians and scholars
to prove that Sikhism was closer to Christianily and Islam
than to Hinduism. They forced Sikhisim into the moulds of
Semitic theologies. Sikhism, they pronounced, was monotheistic
while
Hinduism was Polytheistic. Sikhism had a Book in the Adi Granth
like the Bible and the Quran, while Hinduism had no Book.
Sikhisim, like Christianity and Islam, had an apostolic tradition
in its ten Gurus, while Hinduisim knew no Prophets.
Sikhism frowned upon idolatory while Hinduism was full of it.
Sikhism had no use for the Vedas, the Puranas and the social
system of the Dharmashastras which formed cornerstones of
Hinduism. And so on, this exercise in alienating Sikhism from its
parent Hinduism has been painstaking as well as perisitent.
No wonder that this perverted version of Sikhism should start
showing signs of fanaticism and bigotry which have all along
characterised monotheistic creeds like Islam and Christianity.
Monotheism is the mother of all closed societies and closed
cultures. It always divides mankind into believers and non-
believers, momims and kafirs, and sets the one against the
other. Sikh Gurus had struggled indefatiguably to rid this
country of this ideological barbarism brought in by Islamic
invaders. They had stood squarely for humanism, universalism and
pluralism which have always been the hallmarks of Hindu spiri-
tuality. By forcing Sikhism into monotheistic moulds Sikh
scholars have betrayed the Gurus. Sooner this scholarship is
disowned by the Sikh society at large, the better it will be
for its spiritual and cultural welfare.
There is no dearth of Sikh scholars who continue to see Sikh
spirituality in the larger and older spiritual tradition of the
Upanishads and the Puranas. But the dominant Sikh politicians who
control the SGPC purse have progressively extended their
patronage to the misinterpreters of Sikh scriptures. Let us hope
that it is a passing phase and that truth will triumph in the
long run. The Sikh scholars who cherish the spirituality
bequeathed by the Gurus should come forward and make themselves
heard more and more. Their voice is bound to ring true in the
heart of the Sikh masses--a heart which is still tuned to Sabad-
Kirtan, singing the ancient strains of Sanatana Dharma.
continues..
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