SAYINGS OF GURU NANAK
A Dictionary of the Thought of the Founder of Sikhism
By Professor Harnam Singh Shan, formerly professor and
chairman, Guru Nanak Chair, Panjab University, Chandigarh.
Pages
636, Price Rs. 70 (Hard bound)
A Review
by R.M. Chopra*
* 678 Marshall House, 25 Strand Road, Kolkata 700 001.
Guru Nanak (1469-1538 AD) was a crusading prophet who lived an
ideal life based on true moral and spiritual principles, and saved many a
people from moral and spiritual death by removing the deep-seated superstitions
and the veil of ignorance. He was responsible for echoing the voice of God on
earth. He brought the divine message of love and spirituality for the people at
large by way of hymns singing the glory of God, which are duly enshrined in Sri
Guru Granth Sahib.
Guru Nanak was born in a critical period of Indian History. The
rulers oppressed the subjects and the condition of the low caste was much worse
because they were refused access to the domain of knowledge and enlightenment.
The communal hatred of the ruling Muslim elite against the Hindu subjects was
prevalent. The society was faced with ruthless religious persecution and forced
mass conversions. Added to this, the Hindu priestly class, instead of giving
solace to the terror-stricken laity, thrust it deeper into superstitious
terror, in order to protect its vested interest and further strengthen its own
position. As a consequence of this, ignorance, superstition, religious bigotry,
suspicion of one another and social evils emanating from these ills had taken
deep roots. The condition of the society in general was chaotic. In this
back-ground, Guru Nanak appeared on the scene.
While quite a boy, Nanak was indignant to witness the hypocrisy
and cant that was prevalent in the land. He made up his mind to devote his life
to the service of the nation and rid it of hypocrisy and bring his people back
to a religion of simplicity and sincerity. As he grew, he was greatly
influenced by the Bhakti movement enunciated by Ramanand, Kabir, Ravidas,
Namdev, Jaidev and others. He had a firm belief that God is all-pervasive and
He resides in the heart of a devotee. It is futile to search Him outside by
going on pilgrimages and it is equally useless to perform various rites and
rituals.
Guru Nanak was also profoundly influenced by the Sufis who were
deeply religious, led an ecstatic life, practiced self-discipline for attaining
intuitive knowledge of God, or fana-annihilation in God. Some of the
important feature of Sufism which are distinctly found in the thoughts and
teachings of Guru Nanak are: Ecstatic loving devotion to God, self
annihilation in god, love of God, through love of humanity and love of music.
With the intention of putting an end to the Hindu-Muslim
conflict, while deriving inspiration from the fundamental tenets of both these
religious systems, Guru Nanak promulgated his new faith, Sikhism, wherein he
not only tried to reconcile the two traditional religions in a harmonious way,
which was the need of the hour, but also gave a new direction for universal
ideas of humanity, moral upliftment, justice and pursuit of
godliness-principles which, in fact, form the real religion of man for all
times. He set an example by taking as companions one Hindu, Bala, and one
Muslim, Mardana, the first ever example of real secularism in practice, and
visited different Holy places of both Hindus as well as Muslims.
Guru Nanak traveled far and wide: as far as Tibet in the north,
Sri Lanka in the south, Burma (now Myanmar) in the east and as far as Anatolian
Peninsula in the west, with his message of love. His wide travels and contacts
with diverse people, cultures and religious thoughts made his outlook
cosmopolitan and universal and, in his religious thoughts, he tried to show
that humanity is one and the differences in race, caste, and creed are only
artificial.
In his teachings, Guru Nanak has been a great critic of the
absurdities of the caste system and has ridiculed superfluous rites and
rituals. He has spoken in most sarcastic tenor about all outward forms of
worship, penances and pilgrimages to Holy places as useless for
God-realisation. He tried to remove deep rooted superstitions of the people
professing different religious faiths and set an example by living the ideal
life himself.
Guru Nanak “rose above nationalism and secular humanism and
advocated super-nationalism and spiritual humanism”. In the spiritual sphere,
according to him, all human beings are equal. Therefore, religious tolerance,
understanding of others’ views and sympathy, which are so important and valued
today, cannot possibly be more clearly exemplified in any other form of
religious thought than in Sikhism
Guru Nanak’s great emphasis on the reality of the Oneness,
Immanence and Transcendence of God, Brotherhood of Man, High Morality and Truth
was immensely successful in bringing together the Hindus and the Muslims. As a
seer, a saint, a redeemer, a divine master and a spiritual preceptor, he
enjoyed so much reverence and popularity in his own life-time that his name
became a legend which is reflected in the popular saying of the time-
Guru Nanak Shah Faqir!
Hindu ka
Guru, Musalman ka Pir.
Guru Nanak has left behind a glorious tradition of holiness and
disciplined worldliness, tolerance and benevolence, creative and practical activity.
He was an embodiment of love and understanding, contentment and compassion,
forgiveness and forbearance, piety and humanity. He was indeed a religious
prophet who was far ahead of his times and, when he spoke, his sublime thoughts
came clothed in words aglow with a rare poetic fervour that lifted his ideas to
a level of high and sublime literature, hence their irresistible charm to the
listener. All the sayings, containing his thoughts and message, are enshrined
in Sri Guru Granth Sahib.
Professor Harnam Singh Shan, MA, Ph.D., D.Litt., is a scholar
of eminence in Panjabi, Hindi, Urdu, Persian and English. He was formerly
Chairman of Guru Nanak Chair and Head of Panjabi as well as Sikh Studies at
Panjab University, Chandigarh. His field of study and research work deals with
a variety of subjects on Panjabi language, literature, culture, history,
tradition and philosophy, with particular reference to Sufi and Sikh studies.
His studies have been published by various universities, academies, foundations,
institutes as well as by reputed Indian and foreign journals which have been
well received in India and abroad. He is a recipient of many awards such as:
Sahitya Shiromani Award of the Panjab Government and Chandigarh
Administration’s Award for “Excellence in Literature”. He has also received
awards from the Government of India, University Grants Commission, Indian
Council of Historical Research and Guru Gobind Singh Foundation, Chandigarh. He
has to his credit more than four-score books, innumerable monographs and papers
particularly on Sikh religion, Sikh scriptures and Sikh lore.
The book under review entitled-SAYINGS OF GURU NANAK, A
DICTIONARY OF THE THOUGHT OF THE FOUNDER OF SIKHISM, by Professor Harnam Singh
Shan, is a collection of some of the simple, terse, pithy and popular
quotations taken from the hymns of Guru Nanak contained in Sri Guru Granth
Sahib. These sayings are mentioned in Panjabi and have also been translated
into English, with meaningful commentary. Any translation into another language,
it must be admitted,cannot do full justice to the original text because full
vigour and vitality of the original cannot be transferred. Despite these
constraints, Professor Shan has done quite an appreciable job in capturing the
original subject as far as practical for the benefit of those English-speaking
people who desire to know, understand, meditate upon and follow the message and
the teachings of the founder of Sikhism. Another laudable job done by Professor
Shan, for which he must have laboured hard, is that these Sayings have been
arranged theme-wise, and subject-wise, with most appropriate headings, giving
references of the original Ragas and the page-numbers as mentioned in Sri Guru
Granth Sahib, and are presented in an alphabetical order, for easy reference,
thus making his production a veritable dictionary of the Sayings and Thoughts
of Guru Nanak.
The SAYINGS OF GURU NANAK are extremely relevant today and we
can look forward to a better and brilliant future because the more we realize
the value of comparative study of philosophy and religion, and look for unity
amidst diversity, especially in the context of modern India with
multi-ethno-religio-cultures and heterogeneous populations striving hard for
communal harmony, the more we shall realize the importance of practicability of
liberal, humane, universal and synthetic outlook of the ethical, moral and
spiritual thoughts and sayings of Guru Nanak.
The revised edition of SAYINGS OF GURU NANAK is highly commendable and worth reading. It should be a much sought-after compendium by all those who are interested and seek solace from the thoughts of the founder of Sikhism. The book has an excellent get-up, exquisite printing and hard binding; the price is also very moderate and affordable. This book is recommended especially for the students and research scholars engaged in the study of comparative religions.
Development
– A Saga of Two Worlds
By V. Nath#
A
Review by Avtar Singh Rikhy*
* B/64 Paschimi Marg, Vasant
Vihar, New Delhi. 110 057. (Ph. 2614-7000)
# Dr V. Nath, I.A.S.(Retd.) who passed away last year was an occasional contributor to this Journal. Mrs Kamala Nath can be reached at A-5/6 Vasant Vihar, New Delhi 110 057. (Ph: 2674-5183)
“Development A Saga of
Two Worlds” by V. Nath, is more than an autobiography of a perceptive
administrator of vision and irreprochable integrity. It provides some
significant insights into the working of India Planning Commisssion in 1950’s
in particular, its Evaluation Division of which Dr. Nath became a Director in
the formative years. While he refers to Pt. Jawahar Lal Nehru as the dynamic
chairman of the Planning Commission, whose vision inheres in successive plans that
transformed the Indian economy, he also mentions that Pt. Nehru had not
critically examined in depth the “Soviet model” of planned development. For
example, Pt. Nehru seems to have been oblivious of the fact that while 99% of
the Soviet agricultural land was covered by state-owned and run cooperatives,
the 1% which was left to be cultivated and husbanded by individual peasants
contributed nearly 30% of the country’s stock of food grains, fruits, vegetable
and poultry products.
Dr. Nath’s analysis of the cooperative farming, sponsored on a
pilot basis in the Fifties in some states, showed that, despite the hyperbole,
it had hardly succeeded at grass roots level. On the one end of the spectrum
were the rich landlords who used the cover of cooperatives comprising their own
family members and close relatives “to escape the Land Ceiling Acts”, while, on
the other end of the spectrum, were underprivileged landless labourers who did
not have the werewithal to develop the allotted arid land into productive
fields. These realistic findings were however brushed aside by the
authorities-that-be and cooperative farming, despite itw known weaknesses,
became the slogan of the Plans.
Similarly, Evaluation Studies of the newly launched Community
Development Programme showed that it lacked well researched and realistic
in-depth micro planning and was not getting integrated as a meaningful and
productive programme at the grass-roots level. It was getting increasingly
vitiated by the “unholy nexus” between the petty bureaucrats, self-seeking
local representatives and rapacious contractors. No effective remedial measures
were, however, taken to address the root problem, with the result that these
shortcomings persisted over the decades.
Dr. Nath’s tenure as a UNDP expert in Sierra Leone and Gambia,
etc. brought home to him how the clash of human egos at various levels warped
the functioning of the Untied Nations Agencies at grass roots level and
generated a feeling of dissatisfaction and insecurity amongst its dedicated
personnel.
For the people of united Punjab, the Autobiography is of
special interest as it records how Partition of the country in 1947 uprooted
the Sikh and Hindu families, who, through hard work and innate entrepreneurial
skills, rehabilitated themselves, while keeping intact their humanistic and
moral values. His devotion to his parents, his wife and children is an eloquent
testimony to the uplifting civilizational values of the middle class. The
quintessence of his life time;s experience is reflected in the last chapter
entitled “Reflections”. He has thoughtfully added an index to facilitate
reference.
A worthwhile reading for all those interested in understanding
origins of state planning and implementation in the post-independence era.
v