The wonder that was india

'Abdu'llah Khweshgi concludes his obituary of Kabir by quoting about twenty of Kabir's verses with sufic explanations.

Modern scholars overemphasize the Hindu aspect of Kabir and Nanak, but both sages mirror the spiritual movement which relentlessly fought against simple-minded Hindu and Muslim ritualism, die-hard fanaticism, and religious, sectarian, class, and

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colour distinctions. They were the devotees of an omnipotent and omniscient God and intensely loved all living beings.

Kabir's nirguna Brahma (Supreme Being) has both a transcendental and an immanent nature. He is the God of gods, Supreme Lord, primal and omnipotent. Kabir's notion of the void, referred to as sunya, is based on Mahayana Buddhism and on Hindu esoteric philosophy. It represents his concept of the 'ultimate reality'. Although he refers to 'reality' by more commonly used Hindu and Muslim names, the word he most frequently uses is 'Rama' who, as he himself explains, is nirguna Rama. He reminds us:

Kabir, call Him Ram who is omnipresent; We must discriminate in mentioning the two Rams; The one Ram (God) is contained in all things; The other (Ram Chandra) is only contained in one thing, himself.13

Kabir equated Ram with Rahim (the Merciful), Hari with Hazrat, and Krishna with Karim, but it was his frequent identification of Ram with Rahim that went a long way to make the bhakti movement a unique religious experience in the Indian subcontinent. Denouncing idolatry, Kabir wrote that if God were found worshipping stone, he would worship it in a hand-mill, which 'grindeth corn for the world to eat'. To him, the prayers, pilgrimages, and fasting of the Muslims were equally mechanical. Essentially a bhakta (devotee), Kabir was totally absorbed in his devotion to the Supreme. But he was also deeply upset by Hindu and Muslim intolerance and religious chauvinism. Ironically, after his death, his Hindu and Muslim disciples could not even agree on the disposal of his corpse. The Hindus wished to cremate him; the Muslims fought to bury him. There are two samadhis (graves) of Kabir at Maghar; one is venerated by Hindus, the other by Muslims. The Hindu Kabir Panthis and their branches are more prominent than the Muslim ones, although his verses were frequently quoted by Muslims, even by the puritan Naqshbandiyya leaders such as the Mujaddid Alf-i Sani and his descendants. The rawza (tomb) of Kabir is maintained by a Muslim keeper who collects the offerings, but the modern politicized Muslim of the subcontinent is indifferent to Kabir.

Unlike that of Kabir, the broad outline of Guru Nanak's life is reasonably clear. He was born in the village of Talwandi, later known as Nankana Sahib, south-west of Lahore, now in Pakistan, in 1469. His father, Kalu, a khattri (member of the Hindu commercial classes), was a village accountant and, as was customary with members of that profession, supplemented his income through

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agriculture. Attempts were made to give Nanak lessons in Hinduism and the official Persian language, but Nanak was interested in meditation, not in formal learning. When Nanak was sixteen, his parents arranged his marriage, and under pressure from his family he later became a merchant and a farmer. Nevertheless, most of his time was spent with yogis who lived in the surrounding jungles.

Guru Nanak's brother-in-law, Jai Ram, a steward of Dawlat Khan of Sultanpur, the Lodi governor of the region lying between Sirhind and Dipalpur, secured a position for him in the Khan's commissariat. There, the minstrel Bha'i Mardana joined him, and they became lifelong friends. While at Sultanpur, the Guru shocked both Muslims and Hindus by declaring that there was neither a (true) Hindu nor a (true) Muslim. His spiritual sensitivity had reached its climax. Soon afterwards, accompanied by Bha'I Mardana, Nanak travelled from Panipat to Assam, visiting Hindu and sufi pilgrim centres. According to the Sikh hagiological literature, he conversed with sufis and bhaktas who had died long ago, but these dialogues in fact took place spiritually in Nanak's mental vision. By 1520 the Guru and his friend were back in the Panjab to witness the carnage during Babur's third invasion of India. Nanak's sensitive heart was poured into the verses known as Babur-Vani. They are invaluable as an historical document.

Guru Nanak's second journey took him down south, as far as Ceylon. Returning from there he visited Kashmir. It is not unlikely that later on he travelled as far as Mecca and Baghdad; such travels were customary with Muslim wandering dervishes and yogis who did not bind themselves with religious forms and taboos. In later life, Guru Nanak lived mainly in the Panjab, occasionally visting Ajodhan, Multan, and Gorakhtari in Peshawar. On 22 September 1539 he died at Kartarpur. Before his death he had appointed his disciple Lihna as his successor.

Although Lihna came from a rich family, in keeping with the traditions of sufi khanqahs, he had previously been made to perform such humiliating duties as carrying loads of wet grass. As the first Guru he was known as Guru Angad (1539-42). This title, meaning 'of my own limb', was bestowed on him by Guru Nanak himself. Although the word 'guru' in Nanak's teachings stood for the voice of God, and not necessarily for an individual, posterity recognizes him as the personification of the light of God. The Hindu incarnation theories became the cardinal feature of Guru Nanak's movement. The sufi idea of the transmission of a pir's light to his successor was also emphasized. The disciples of Guru Nanak and his successors formed themselves into a panth or the order of Gurmats, the followers of the Guru's doctrine. During the lifetime

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of the third Guru, Amar Das (1552-74), the hymns of the first three Gurus, and those of the sants and sufis whose teachings were compatible with the Guru's aphorisms, were compiled. In 1603-4 the fifth Guru, Arjan Deva (1581-1606), added his own compilation and that of his father to the earlier collection. The volume was entitled the Adi Granth, later known as Guru Granth Sahib. It became the divine scripture of the panth, and the followers of the Guru's teachings, as recorded in it or expressed in the corporate will of the community, were known as Sikhs.

The execution of Guru Arjan by Jahangir, for blessing the rebel Prince Khusraw, transformed the Sikhs into a martial race. Although the Gurus themselves belonged to the urban mercantile community of khattris, their followers, who were rural Jats, are the backbone of the Sikh community. Before his death the tenth Guru, Gobind Singh (1675-1708), closed the line of personal Gurus; henceforth the scripture, or the Guru Granth Sahib, and the corporate will of the community, the panth or Khalsa Panth of Guru Gobind Singh, were to be recognized as their sole guide. Their political struggles made the followers of Gurmat - the Sikhs - radically different from the panths or orders of earlier bhaktas or saints.

Guru Nanak's doctrine of salvation through the divine name (nam) was similar to the teachings of the sants, but it was more consistently sufic. Their Upanishadic interpretations are also equally valid. In His primal aspect, Guru Nanak's Lord is the eternally unchanging formless one (nirankar), inscrutable (agam), boundless (apar), beyond time (akal), ineffable (alakh), with divine will (qudrat) - in the technical sense of sufism, beyond comprehension. Nanak's loving devotion to God is expressed in the forms of address he uses, such as Pita (Father), Pritam (Lover), and Khasam (Husband or Master). According to the nature of the occasion and mood, Guru Nanak selected traditional terms used by Hindus and Muslims to invoke God, such as Allah, Khuda, Rabb, Rama, Govinda, Hari, and Murari. But it is Guru Ka Sabad, or the Guru's word (a divine voice mystically heard within the human heart), that reinvigorates the spiritual sensitivity of the devotee. This is the mysterious Ism-i A'zam (the Great Name) of the sufis. A meditation upon the essence of the nam (divine name) is the real nam simaran (holding the divine name in remembrance) or nam japan (repetition of the divine name) and not mechanical repetition of the name of God. This is. sufi zikr par excellence. The creative activity of the Supreme is His hukam (the divine 'order'), the counterpart of riza (divine will) in sufi terminology.

Nanak's teachings infused a stern ethical tone and a practical approach into the problems of life. He advocated living a normal

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life accompanied by piety and righteousness. He envisaged a society in which cultivators prepared the soil for sowing properly, and merchants were honest. Income earned from dishonest means included the sale of the forbidden products of pork and beef to Muslims and Hindus respectively. He condemned the social prejudices surrounding the concepts of high and low castes, believing that only those who considered themselves nich (low) before God attained salvation.

Like those of Kabar, Dadu's biographical details are shrouded with myths and legends. There are many other similarities. It is generally agreed that he was born in 1544, but that his birthplace was Ahmadabad is disputed. His father, Lodi Ram, was said to have been a merchant but possibly he was a converted Muslim cotton-carder, and Dadu's name was also Dawud with interchangeable Persian letters in the words 'Dadu' and 'Dawud'. Dadu's life was spent at Sambhar in Rajasthan, and it is not improbable that he was even born in one of the villages of the region. The teacher who revolutionized Dadu's ideas belonged to the Ramanandi tradition; Dadu's Hindu disciple, Sundar Das, refers to him as Vriddhananda. In the Muslim tradition he is called Buddhan. Both names suggest that he was an elderly sage. The traditions also relate that the Supreme Being appeared to Dadu in the character of an old ascetic and initiated him into divine truth. His growing fame in Rajasthan resulted in the Emperor Akbar's leading dignitary, Raja Bhagavan Das, becoming his disciple. The Raja introduced him to the Emperor before Akbar's departure from Fathpur-Sikri for Kabul in 1584. After a short stay at the capital, Dadu left for Rajasthan. In the last days of his life he left for Nara'ina in Rajasthan, where he died in 1603.14

Dadu's eldest son, Garib Das, performed his father's last rites and was accepted by his father's disciples as his successor. Before long, however, Garib Das resigned from this position, and the responsibility for the direction of the panth was assumed by his disciples. Dadu's hymns and poems, known as Bani (inspired utterances or oracles), were compiled by his favourite disciples such as Tila (a Jat), Mohan Daftari, Rajjab Das, and Sundar Das the younger. The eighteenth-century decline of the Mughals and Rajputs transformed the Dadu Panthis into nagas or professional fighters.

Dadu was deeply influenced by Kabir, who is frequently mentioned in his Bani. In his hymns Dadu reiterates that Ram, Govind, and Allah are his spiritual teachers and he occupies a distinctive place in the galaxy of the saints such as Namdev, Pipa, Sena, Raidas, and Kabir. Dadu's cosmology and the stages of the soul's

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pilgrimage are markedly sufic. Like later Kabir Panthis, Dadu Panthis also became predominantly Hindu.

The Hindu traditions treasure the memory of the sants and bhaktas for their subtle mystical thought and lyrical verses in regional languages; but Hindu spiritual devotion was, and is, satisfied only by accepting the son of Dasratha, or Krishna, as the human incarnation (avatara) of the Absolute. Their saguna, rather nirguna, form is dear to the Hindu heart. It was this spiritual yearning that made the sixteenth-century Mirabal, Surdas, and Tulsidas the greatest poets of the bhakti movement in Hindi, although their imagery and terminology are impregnated with sant traditions.

Mirabal, the only daughter of Ratna Singh, a Rajput noble of the House of Rathor, was born in c. 1498 in a village in Merta near Ajmir. In 1516 she was married to Bhoja Raj, the heir apparent of Rana Sanga of Mewar. Her husband died before his father, however, and she had no children. In her poems Mira speaks of herself as a virgin. She invited sadhus (Hindu mendicants) to the women's quarters in the palace and mingled with Hindu holy men in the temples in her town. The members of her royal household could not tolerate her devotion to these ascetics; in order to discipline her they frequently chastised her, locked her up, and even tried to poison her. Such stories are, however, discounted by many authorities. What her poems suggest is that her fervent devotion to Lord Krishna had made her totally indifferent to worldly life. She seems to have died around 1546.

Mirabai's extraordinarily brilliant poetry, known as Padavati (a series of poems), portrays a feeling of deep personal association with the Lord Krishna and a yearning to dissolve herself in Him. Her Lord is not nirguna, nor totally indescribable, but is interchangeable with her beloved Shyama (Krishna). She advocates image worship and the observance of special fasts and takes delight in describing Vishnu's descent to earth. Like Chaitanya, she is transported to the heights of ecstasy and bliss by singing and dancing. She had no hesitation in saying:

My Beloved dwells in my heart, I have actually seen that Abode of Joy. Mira's Lord is Hari, the Indestructible. My Lord, 1 have taken refuge with Thee, Thy slave.15

Vallabhacharya (1479-1530), of the Telugu-speaking region of south India, reinvigorated the Krishna bhakti traditions with his

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Sanskrit works. Besides the Vedanta and Bhagavad Gita, they are greatly influenced by the Bhagavata Purana. In them Krishna is sat-cit ananda (existence, intelligence, and bliss) personified. When the devotee's soul is dissolved in Krishna, he is transported into the Lord's own ineffable bliss. The Lord's grace is attainable by singing hymns praising Krishna, listening to His legends, worshipping His image, and making pilgrimages to Vaishnava shrines. Vallabha established the Srinath temple on Goverdhan hill, west of Mathura. He almost ignored Radha, who was later made predominant in Vallabha's system by his son Vitthalnath (1515—88?).

In 1571 Vitthalnath established his centre at Gokul near Mathura and gathered together a group of singers and poets known as asht chap (the eight seals or insignia). They believed themselves to be Krishna's favourites and wrote in the Braj Bhasha dialect with great refinement and ecstasy. Nanddas and Surdas were the most venerated poets among them.

Nanddas's (?1533—85) padas (poems for singing) have been rendered into English by R. S. McGregor under the title The Round Dance of Krishna and Uddhav's Message. They portray the soul's love and longing for God, matched by God's perfect love and grace, through the symbolism of the herd-girls' revels with Krishna on the bank of the Jamuna.16

Nanddas's contemporary, the blind poet Surdas (c. 1478-1583), vividly deals with all the details of Krishna's life, from His birth, and His activities as a child, including the theft of butter, to the herd-girls' love for Him and His for them. He portrays Radha with great devotion in his magnum opus, the Sur Sagar (Sir's Ocean), as well as in other poems. The melody of Krishna's defence in the poem 'I Didn't Eat the Butter Ma' transports the listener to the realm of spiritual ecstasy. But all Sur's poetry symbolizes the truth that social duties and even the universe and life itself are meaningless without the love of the Lord.

Surdas's contemporary, Tulsidas (1532-1623), identifies Lord Rama with the Absolute, although he does not reject the nirguna Absolute. His magnum opus, the Ram-charit-manas (The Lake of the Story of Rama), or the Rdmdyana in Hindi, is the bible of north Indian Hindus. Tulsidas is believed to be a reincarnation of Valmlki, the author of the Sanskrit Ramayana. Its lyrical fervour and devotional sensitivity are miraculous. In Tulsidas's Vinaya-patrika and the Kavitavali there are references to some details of his own life and his political, social, and economic environment, but it is misleading to interpret them literally. They are designed to remind his readers of the sinful condition of Kal-yuga (the Dark Age), beginning from the Christian era, when alien kings ruled much of India and

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plunged the country into a progressive decline of piety and ethical values. Akbar's rule is not necessarily the target of Tulsidas's attack. In his world-view, hypocrisy and tyranny were common to all temporal rulers, whom he compares with Ravana (the Demon); and he invokes Rama to kill them in order to restore the environment in which devotion to the Lord could be promoted uninterruptedly. The messianic hopes of Muslim mystics are similar to those of Tulsidas.

The Ram-charit-manas idealizes all forms of human relationships, but the most impressive is the devotion of Hanuman to Rama. Not only does the monkey devotee imprint 'Rama's lotus feet upon his heart', Rama's affection for his devotee is also deep and warm. Indeed human beings and God are indispensable to each other. The only counterpart of the lyrical idealization of Hanuman by Tulsidas is the visionary treatment of the gopts by Krishna. Both open the doors of bhakti (devotion) to men and women of all classes and reinvigorate touching streaks of tender human relations between all fellow-beings and their Lord.

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REFERENCES

1. Alberuni's India, II, pp. 137-8.

2. The Wonder That Was India, Volume I, pp. 299-300.

3. Ibid., p. 328.

4. Ibid., p. 332.

5. Sahaja means 'that which is inborn or the quintessence which all the animate and inanimate possess by virtue of their very existence; the realization of this sahaja was regarded by the Sahijiyas (those who yearned for sahaja) as the highest attainment of spiritual yearning. They condemned, in the strongest language they could command, all kinds of insincerity and artificiality in life and religion and, at the same time, recommended the most natural path for the attainment of truth'. — S. B. Dasgupta, Obscure Religious Cults, pp. 164 - 5. There were both Vaishnavite and Buddhist Sahajiyas.

6. 'Tantrism is followed by certain left-hand sects of Hindus and Buddhists. Shaivites (sects like the Saktas, Siddhas, Nathas, Kapalikas, and the Vaishnavite Sahajiyas) practise Tantrism. In common parlance, tantra means an esoteric literature of a religious and practical nature. In Buddhism it includes a mass of heterogeneous elements, the chanting and muttering of mantras (syllables or sacred verses from the scriptures), describing various mystic diagrams, making postures and gestures, worshipping various types of gods and goddesses including a host of demi-gods and other such beings, meditation and salutation of various types, and, last but not least, yogic practices, sometimes involving sex

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relations.' S. B. Dasgupta, An Introduction to Tdntric Buddhism, p. 2.

7. M. A. Macauliffe, The Sikh Religion, VI, pp. 69-70.

8. Dasgupta, Obscure Hindu Cults, p. 124.

9. Rizvi, A History of Sufism in India, I, p. 373.

10. According to the Ma'ariju 'l-wilayat, Shaykh Taqi, the pir of Kabir, was also a weaver and lived in Kara Manikpur. Ma 'ariju 'l-wilayat, Shirani collection, Panjab University Library, ff. 344b-45a.

11. Sufis who outwardly behave outrageously in order to make themselves appear disgusting to the Muslims.

12. Ma'ariju 'l-wilayat, ff. 345-47a; Rizvi, A History of Sufism in India, II, p. 413.