Our Guru
We come across lot of people who question the 'Guruship' of Guru Granth Sahibji. These people also try to justify the status of Guru to some other granth. So, I went through the pages of the histiry and here are some crucial evidences which specifically calls out that our Guru is Guru Granth Sahibji. This will clear lot of air among those who question Dhur Ki Bani to justify their stand.
People should think 1000 times before they question Guruship of Guru Granth Sahibji & compare it with any other writing. Please be clear when they actually question the Guruship of Guru Granth Sahibji then simultaneously they also question Guru Gobind Singh Sahibhji as well.
1) The fact that Granth Got the Guruship is affirmed by the testimony of Sainapat, who was not only a contemporary of the Guru but was also one of his darbari kavis (court poets) at Anandpur Sahib. His work Gursobha, composed in A.D. 1711, within three years of the Guru’s death, records the details
2) The account of Sainapat is supported by Bhai Nand Lal, a devoted disciple, who was present at Nanded at the time of the Guru’s death. He tells us in his Rehatnama that the Guru told him that his one form is the formless Supreme Spirit and the other Granth Ji – Guru Sabad, the Word of the great Gurus incorporated in the holy Granth Sahib. ‘Have no doubt about it, he said, ‘the visible form is the Sikhs, the Khalsa should remain absorbed in the Gurbani day and night’
3) Bhai Prahlad Singh, another associate of Guru Gobind Singh also corroborates the above mentioned Guru’s commandment in his Rehatnama as following :
"With the order of the Eternal Lord has been established the Panth.All the Sikhs are hereby commanded to obey the Granth as the Guru"
4) Similarly Bhai Chaupa Singh, another associate of Guru Gobind Singh, had also mentioned this commandment in his Rehatnama
5) Koer Singh, the author of Gurbilas Patshahi 10 (composed in A.D. 1751-1762) has not only supplied more details of this historical event, but has also provided clarity to the tradition. He tells us in explicit terms that Guru Gobind Singh discontinued the line of personal Guruship and did not appoint anyone to succeed him as the Guru.
In fact, he had surrendered his personality to the Khalsa when he had become one of them at the baptismal ceremony. Koer Singh also narrates at length the formal installation of Sri Guru Granth Sahib as the Guru. The author records that the Guru addressed his Sikhs before his demise and instructed them that there would be no successor to him, the Sarbat Sangat and the Khalsa should deem Sri Guru Granth Sahib as Supreme
6) Koer Singh had been in close association with Bhai Mani Singh who was a contemporary and a close associate of Guru Gobind Singh. Bhai Mani Singh was the first person to act as the Granthi (reader of Holy Granth Sahib) in the Harmandir Sahib at Amritsar after the Guru’s death. Therefore, the information passed on from Bhai Mani Singh to Koer Singh is believed to be fully reliable
7) Another work, which we may refer to here, is Bansavalinama of Kesar Singh Chhibbar (completed in A.D. 1779). Kesar Singh’s ancestors had been in the service of Guru Gobind Singh as dewans. The Tenth Chapter of Bansavalinama deals with the life of Guru Gobind Singh. In stanzas 678-83, the author mentions the demise of the Guru and his last commandment in reply to the question of the Sikhs as following:“The Granth is the guru; you hold the garment (seek the protection) of the Timeless God”
8) Further, the account of the demise of Guru Gobind Singh as given in Mahima Parkash by Sarup Dass Bhalla may be accepted as historical and objective. This account was completed in A.D. 1830KK/ AD 1773. The author was a descendant of Guru Amar Das, the third Guru of the Sikhs. The account given in Mahima Parkash is objective and without any poetic embellishments and supernatural elements. Therefore, the evidence of this author can be accepted as historically correct. According to Mahima Parkash, before his demise. Guru Gobind Singh called his Sikhs to his presence and said :
"Our ten forms have come to an end. Now recognize the Guru Granth Sahib in my place. He who wishes to talk to me should read the Granth Sahib. I have entrusted you to the lap of the Almighty"
9) Dr. Ganda Singh has referred to reliable authority. Munshi Sant Singh’s Bayan-ki-Khandan-i-Nishan-Bedi
The Guru replied ‘Guru Khalsa, Khalsa Guru’. Then the Guru, with five paise and a coconut in his hand, bowed before the Guru Granth Sahib and said, ‘Ye all community should recognize the Guru Granth Sahib as the Guru after me and obey the commandments contained therein’. And then he uttered the following couplet :
"Recognize the Guru Granth as the visible body of the Guru"
10) Muhammad Ali Khan Ansari, the author of Tarikh-i-Mazaffari (1810 A.D.) and Tarikh-i-Bahr-ul-Mawwaj, narrates the history of the Mughals to the beginning of the region of Akbar Shah II. These works deal extensively with the struggle of the Sikhs against the Mughals and the Afghans. They are considered to be important sources on the history of the Punjab during the eighteenth century. Before the end of Guru Gobind Singh’s account, Muhammad Ali Khan writes that:
After him (Guru Gobind Singh), according to the faith of these people (the Sikhs), the descending of Guruship and of internal spiritual line came to end and the book, the Granth, was established in place of the Guru.
11) Sohan Lal Suri tells us that during the last moments of Guru Gobind Singh’s life a disciple of his asked him to whom he had appointed as Guru after him. Thereupon the Guru replied that:The Guru is Granth Ji. There is no difference between the Granth and the Guru: From the darshna of GranthJi one shall have the happy darshan of the Guru Sahib.
12) The above version is also confirmed by the Muslim historian of the nineteenth century. Ghulam Muhy-ud-Din alias Bute Shah in his Tawarik-i-Punjab (1848)59 and Mufti-Ali-Din in his Ibrat Namah (1854)60 have both recorded the demise of Guru Gobind Singh as a historical fact.
Bute Shah in his abridged recension of the Tawarik-i-Punjab (preserved in the Punjab Public Library, Lahore) has followed Lala Sohan Lal’s Umdat-ul-Tawarikh in recording the last commandment of the Guru regarding the Granth being the Guru after his death and that ‘there is no difference between the Guru and the Granth.
13) All the European historians of the nineteenth century like John Malcolm, W.G. Osborne, W.L. M’Gregor, Joseph David Cunningham and others who have written on the Sikhs have accepted the above version regarding the demise of Guru Gobind Singh, abolition of the personal Guruship and the succession of Sri Guru Granth Sahib as the Guru of the Sikhs
14) Even Ernest Trumpp, whose observations are very negative on various aspects of the religious literature of the Sikhs, has adopted this tradition. In this context, he writes that .at the time of his demise. Guru Gobind Singh told his followers:
I have entrusted the whole society (of the disciples) to the Timeless. After me you shall everywhere mind the Book of the Granth Sahib as your Guru. Whatever you shall ask, it will show to you. Whosoever be my disciple, he shall consider the Granth as the form of the Guru. Having uttered these verses he closed his eyes and expired (A.D. 1708).
15) Muslim historians of the nineteenth century have also accepted above version. Syed Muhammed Latif, author of the History of the Punjab also records that some time before the death of Guru Gobind Singh when Sikhs asked him as to who would be the Guru after him, while breathing his last the Guru replied:
"I entrust my Khalsa to the Divine Being... The Granth shall support you under all your troubles and adversities in this world, and a sure guide to you hereafter. The Guru shall dwell with the society of disciples. the Khalsa, and wherever there shall be five Sikhs gathered together, there shall the Guru be also present". The Guru also ordered them that: they must have belief in One God and look on the Granth as His inspired law... He then closed his eyes and began to pray, and expired in the performance of his devotion.
References 2- Bhai Nand Lal, "Sakhi Rehat Patshahi 10, Gur Khalsa de Rehatname, ed. Shamsher Singh Ashok, Sikh History Research Board, Amritsar, 1979, p. 51 (unpublished)3-Bhai Parhlad Singh, Rehatnama Bhai Prahlad Singh ka, op.cit., p. 584-Bhai Nand Lal Granthavali, Rehitnama, Sri Guru Vach,p 1925-Koer Singh, Gurbilas Patshahi 10 (Ed. Shamsher Singh Ashok), Punjabi Unviersity, Patiala, 1968, CH. IV, p. 130.7-Kesar Singh Chhibbar, Bansavali-nama Dasam Patshahi Ka (ed. R.S. Jaggi) Pub. in Parakh, Research Bulletin of Punjabi Language and Literature, Punjab University, Chandigarh, Vol II, 1972, Ch. 10, Stanzas 679 and 680, p. 163-34. 8- Sarup Dass Bhalla, Mahima Prakash, Vol. II, Ch. ‘Sakhian Patshahi Das, Sakhi 27, pp. 891-939- Ganda Singh, op. cit., in Perspective on the Sikh Tradition, pp. 198-19910- Tarikh-i-Muzaffeari, p. 152, also Bahrul-Mawwaj, p. 20811-Undat-ut-Tawarikh. Arya Press, Lahore, 1885, Vol. 1, pp. 64-65 12- Bute Shah, Tawarikh-i-Punjab, (Abridged recension), p. 6214- Ernest Trumpp, The Adi Granth. (Eng. Tr.). London, 1877, pp. XC vi15- Syad Muhammed Latif, History of the Punjab, Calcutta 1891, p 269
Now, I would like to ask question to all those who go to so called Baba's. Why do we have to visit them? Why do we have to follow them? Sikhism is not a religion wherein Sikhs needs a mediator to speak to his Guru. Consider Guru Granth Sahibji as your Guru and everything will come to you.
We don't have to do any Idol Worship (moorti pooja), we don't have to visit any 'maseet', we don't have to visit any 'baba', we don't have to visit any 'pandit'. For Sikh everything is Guru and that is Guru Granth Sahibji.
All Thanks to Amarjeet Singh Amar (Brampton, Ontario)
Edited for Babbar Akali
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