CHAPTER VI
About thirty miles south-west of the city of Lahore, the capital of
the Panjab, and on the borders of the present civil districts of
Gujranwala and Montgomery, stands the town of Talwandi, deep in a
lonely forest. It is on the margin
[1. Essay on the Utility of Religion.]
of the Bar or raised forest tract which occupies the centre of the
Panjab. The town is still girdled by a broad expanse of arborescent
vegetation, which, when not whitened by the sand blown by the winds of
the desert, wears through all seasons a cheerful appearance. The jal (Salvadora
Persica) predominates, but there are also found the phulahi (Acacia
modesta) and the jand (Prosopis spicigera). The wild deer is seen
occasionally to appear startled at the traveller who disturbs the
solitude of its domain, and the hare and the partridge cower
cautiously among the thickets, deprecating molestation.
In this retreat was born Guru Nanak, the founder of the Sikh
religion. His birth took place on the third day of the light half of
the month of Baisakh (April-May) in the year 1526 of the Vikramaditya
era, corresponding to A.D. 1469. As to the month in which he was born
there are strange diversities of statement, which we shall
subsequently notice. Guru Nanak's father was Kalu of the Bedi[1]
section of the Khatri caste. He was by profession a village
accountant, but added the practice of agriculture to this avocation.
Kalu's father was Shiv Ram and his mother Banarasi. Kalu had one
brother called Lalu, of whom little is known besides his name. Kalu
was married to Tripta, daughter of Rama, a native of the Manjha[2]
country. Tripta had a brother called Krishan, of whom history is as
silent as of Lalu. Tripta bore to Kalu one daughter, Nanaki, and one
son, Nanak. Nanaki married Jai Ram, a revenue official of high repute
at Sultanpur, which is in the present native state of Kapurthala, and
was then the capital of the Jalandhar Doab.
When Taimur had spread anarchy and devastation over Northern India,
a dynasty of Saiyids, or descendants of the Prophet Muhammad, aspired
to rule in Dihli in the name of the Mughal conqueror. To Dihli there
was hardly any territory attached, and Ala-ul-din, the last of the
Saiyid
[1. The meaning of this name will be explained when we come to the
writings of the tenth Guru.
2. The Mâniha is the country between the rivers Râvi and Biâs.]
rulers, in contemptuous disregard for the small and troublesome
dominion meted out to him by destiny, retired to the distant city of
Badaun to end his days in religious and political tranquillity. He
left Dihli and the fortunes of empire to Bahlol Khan Lodi, a, man
whose ancestors had been enriched by commerce, and whose grandfather
had been Governor of Multan under the famous monarch Firoz Shah
Tughlak.
Bahlol Khan Lodi reigned from A.D. 1450 to A.D. 1488, and it was
consequently near the middle of his reign that Guru Nanak, the founder
of the Sikh religion, was born.
After the accession of Bahlol Khan Lodi, Daulat Khan, a relative of
his, obtained power in the Panjab, and governed under the paramount
authority of his kinsman. He lived in state at Sultanpur till defeated
and deprived of his possessions by the Emperor Babar. The Panjab
appears to have been already parcelled out to Musalman chiefs who were
retainers of the sovereigns of Dihli. One of these chiefs, called Rai
Bhoi, a Musalman Rajput of the Bhatti tribe, had been Zamindar or
proprietor of Talwandi. After his death his heritage descended to his
son Rai Bular, who governed the town at the birth and during the youth
of Nanak.
Talwandi is said to have been originally built by a Hindu king
called Raja Vairat. It was sacked and destroyed by fire and crowbar,
like most Hindu towns and cities, during the Musalman invasions. Rai
Bular restored it and built a fort on the summit of the tumulus, in
which he lived the secure and happy ruler of a small village, some
limited acres of cultivated land, and a boundless wilderness.
Although the age was one of religious intolerance and persecution,
Rai Bular appears to have been the very reverse of a bigot. His father
and he were converted Hindus, doubtless added to the ranks of Islam by
a hasty circumcision and an enforced utterance of some Arabic
sentences which they did not perfectly comprehend.
[1. The descendants of Râi Bulâr still exist in that part of the
country.]
In such a solitude Rai Bular could not have been under the less
worthy influences of Islam; and indifference, the parent of
toleration, appears to have supervened on his Muhammadan religious
training. But the human mind is so constituted, and the religious or
emotional instinct so dominant ill human nature, that most men at some
period of their lives are irresistibly impelled to religious
speculation. Something, too, must be allowed f or Rai Bular's
patriotic prejudices for a suffering though renounced faith. Talwandi
shared not the tumults and excitements of the outer political world.
It was a theatre meet for the training of a prophet or religious
teacher who was to lead his countrymen to the sacred path of truth,
and disenthral their minds from the superstitions of ages. Rai Bular
in his little realm had ample time for reflection, and when he heard
of Nanak's piety and learning, felt a mysterious interest in the
clever and precocious son of Kalu.
The house in which Nanak was born lay a little distant from the
fort. Probably Rai Bular and his family alone inhabited the ancient
tumulus, while his tenants dwelt in he town of Talwandi on the plain.
The town has now lost its old name, and is known as Nankana, in memory
of the religious teacher to whom it had the honour of giving birth.
When the Sikh religion had gained prominence, there was a temple
erected on the spot where the Guru was born. It was afterwards rebuilt
and enlarged by Raja Tej Singh, at the time when the Sikh arms had
attained their greatest power and the Sikh commonwealth its widest
expansion. Within the temple is installed the Granth Sahib, or sacred
volume of the Sikh faith, intoned by a professional reader. The
innermost shrine contains some cheap printed pictures of the Guru, and
musicians beguile the day chanting the religious metrical compositions
of the Gurus.
CHAPTER VII
We shall now examine the principal current accounts of Guru Nanak
and give brief notices of their authors.
The oldest authentic account of the Guru was written by Bhai Gur
Das. who flourished in the end of the sixteenth and the beginning of
the seventeenth century, dying in A.D. 1629. He was first cousin of
the mother of Guru Arjan, the fifth Guru of the Sikhs. He was Guru
Arjan's amanuensis, and wrote out from his dictation the Adi[1] Granth,
or sacred book of the Sikhs, which then contained the hymns of the
first five Sikh Gurus and of the saints who preceded them. He next
wrote what he called Wars or religious cantos. These are forty in
number. The first War begins with the Sikh cosmology, and ends with a
brief account of Guru Nanak and the succeeding Gurus to the date of
Gur Das's composition. Gur Das's object was essentially religious. He
delighted in singing the greatness of God, the littleness of man, and
the excellence of the Guru. Besides the Wars, Gur Das wrote Kabits,
which contains the Sikh tenets and a panegyric of the Gurus.
The details which Gur Das has given of Guru Nanak will be utilized
in the life of that Guru. It is a matter of regret that he did not
write a complete life of the Guru, as its details could at that time
have been easily obtained. The date of the composition of his work is
not given, but it is admitted on all hands that it was during the time
of Guru Arjan. Making due allowance for Gur Das's protracted
employment in copying and collating the sacred volume for Guru Arjan-a
task which was completed in A.D. 1604--it may fairly be assumed that
Gur Das wrote his own work not much more than sixty years after the
demise of Guru Nanak, when some of his contemporaries
[1. The epithet Âdi, which means primitive or first, was bestowed
on the Granth Sâhib of Guru Arjan to distinguish it from the Granth
of Guru Gobind Singh, the tenth Guru, which was subsequently compiled
by Bhâi Mani Singh.]
were still alive, and one of them at least retained the vigour of
his intellectual faculties.
There was then living in the village of Ramdas [1] about twenty
miles north of Amritsar, Bhai Budha, who had embraced the Sikh
religion under Guru Nanak at Kartarpur, and who used to attend him on
some of his peregrinations. This man was in the prime of life when Gur
Das copied the Granth Sahib for Guru Arjan, and the latter made him
reader and custodian of the sacred volume at Amritsar. Bhai Budha
subsequently lived until the Guruship of Guru Har Gobind, when he died
at the ripe age of one hundred and seven years. In such estimation was
he held that he was specially appointed to impress the saffron tilak,
or patch of Gurudom, on the foreheads of the Gurus of his time; and
his descendants had the same honoured privilege as long as legitimate
Gurus remained to be thus distinguished. He, however, has left no
memoirs of the founder of his religion.
Mani Singh was the youngest of five sons of Bika of Kaibowal, in
the Malwa country, and belonged to the Dullat section of the Hindu
jats. The ruins of Kaibowal may now be seen near the village of
Laugowal. When Guru Gobind Singh was going to Kurkhetar on a preaching
excursion, Bika and his son Mani went to a place called Akoi to meet
him and offer him their homage. Bika in due time returned home,
leaving his son with the Guru. The Guru one day asked Mani to wipe the
vessels from which the Sikhs had eaten, and, as an inducement,
promised that as the vessels became bright so should his
understanding. Mani wiped the dishes with great humility and devotion,
and received baptism from the Guru as his reward. He remained a
celibate and devoted his life to the Guru's service.
[1. This was Bhâi Budha's original name, and the village was
called after him. The name Bhâi Budha was given him by Guru Nanak.
The word 'Bhâi' means brother. Guru Nanak, who disregarded caste
and preached the doctrine of the brotherhood of man, desired that all
his followers should be deemed brothers, and thus he addressed them.
The title 'Bhâi' is now bestowed on Sikh priests and others who have
made a special study of the Sikh sacred writings.]
When the tenth Guru found it necessary to go to the south of India,
he took Mani Singh, among others, with him. At Nander, or Abchalanagar,
as it is now called by the Sikhs, the Guru expounded to his followers,
among whom Mani Singh was an enthusiastic listener, the recondite
language of the Granth Sahib or the book par excellence.
After the Guru's death Bhai Mani Singh remained as Granthi, or
reader of the Granth in the Har Mandar in Amritsar.[1] The Sikhs
commissioned him, while so employed, to write them a life of Guru
Nanak. They represented that the Minas, or descendants of Prithi Chand,
had interpolated much incorrect matter in the biography of the Guru,
whereby doubts were produced in the minds of orthodox Sikhs; and they
commissioned Mani Singh to discriminate the true from the false, and
compile a trustworthy life of the founder of their religion. He
accordingly expanded the first of Bhai Gur Das's Wars into a life of
Guru Nanak. It is called the Gyan Ratanawali. Mani Singh wrote another
work, the Bhagat Ralanawali, an expansion of Gur Das's eleventh War,
which contains a list of famous Sikhs up to the time of Guru Har
Gobind. After the demise of Bhai Mani Singh the copyists interlarded
several Hindu ideas in his works.
The hymns of the Adi Granth are arranged under the musical measures
to which they were intended to be sung. Mani Singh thought it would be
better and more convenient to compile the hymns of each Guru
separately. He therefore altered the arrangement of the Granth Sahib,
on which he was censured by the Sikhs. He apologized, and was
subsequently pardoned by the members of his faith.
In A.D. 1738 Mani Singh asked permission of Zakaria Khan, the
Viceroy of Lahore, to allow the Diwali[2] fair to
[1. Bhâi Gyân Singh's Panth Parkâsh.
2 The Diwâli, originally a festival observed only by Hindus in
honour of Lakshmi, their goddess of wealth, on the 15th day of Kârtik
(Oct.-Nov.). It was the date on which Bhâi Budha the first Granthi
{footnote p. lxxvi} completed his perusal of the Granth Sahib, and it
consequently became a Sikh holiday also.]
be held in Amritsar. The Viceroy gave permission on condition that
Mani Singh undertook to pay a poll-tax for every Sikh who attended.
Mani Singh accepted this condition, and sent circulars to the Sikhs to
attend and hold a special Sikh gathering. The Viceroy sent troops to
watch the movements of the Sikhs, but the Sikhs, mistaking their
intention, dispersed. The result was that Mani Singh was unable to pay
the stipulated tax. Upon this he was taken to Lahore for punishment.
Zakaria Khan asked his Qazi what the punishment should be. The Qazi
replied that Mani Singh must either accept Islam or suffer
disjointment of his body. Mani Singh heroically accepted the latter
alternative. The Viceroy adjudged this barbarous punishment, nominally
on account of his victim's nonpayment of the tax, but in reality on
account of his influence as a learned and holy man in maintaining the
Sikh religion. Mani Singh manifested no pain on the occasion of his
execution. He continued to his last breath to recite the Japji of Guru
Nanak and the Sukhmani of Guru Arjan.
Bhai Santokh Singh, son of Deva Singh, was born in Amritsar in A.D.
1788. He received religious instruction in the Sikh faith from Bhai
Sant Singh in his native city, and in the Hindu religion from a Pandit
in Kaul in the Karnal district. He found a patron in Sardar Megh Singh
of Buria, in the present district of Ambala in the Panjab, and under
his auspices translated a work called Amar Kosh from the Sanskrit. In
A.D. 1823 he wrote the Nanak Parkash, an exposition of the life and
teachings of Guru Nanak.
After this Bhai Santokh Singh entered the employ of Maharaja Karm
Singh of Patiala. In A.D. 1825, Bhai Ude Singh of Kaithal obtained his
services from the Maharaja. In Kaithal Bhai Santokh Singh, with the
aid of the Brahmans whom Bhai Ude Singh had placed at his disposal,
translated several works from the Sanskrit. He then set about writing
the lives of the remaining Gurus, and this task he completed during the rainy season of A.D. 1843
under the name of 'Gur Partap Suraj', popularly known as the 'Suraj
Parkash', in six ponderous volumes. The lives of the Gurus, from the
second to the ninth, inclusive, are divided into twelve ruts or
sections, corresponding to the signs of the Zodiac. The life of the
tenth Guru is presented in six ruts, or seasons, corresponding to the
six Indian seasons, and into two ains, the ascending and descending
nodes. The whole work is written in metre, and in difficult Hindi,
with a large admixture of pure Sanskrit words. Santokh Singh's other
works are a paraphrase of the Japji of Guru Nanak and of the Sanskrit
works Atam Puran and Valmik's Ramayan.
Bhai Ram Kanwar, a lineal descendant of Bhai Budha, was specially
favoured by receiving the pahul, or baptism by the dagger, from Guru
Gobind Singh himself; and on that occasion the name of Bhai Gurbakhsh
Singh was bestowed on him.[1] Bhai Gurbakhsh Singh survived by
twenty-five years the tenth and last Guru, and dictated his history to
Bhai Sahib Singh. To the writings of the latter, which are now no
longer extant, Bhai Santokh Singh is said to have been indebted. It
is, however, doubtful whether Bhai Santokh Singh had access to any
trustworthy authority. From his early education and environment he was
largely tinctured with Hinduism. He was unquestionably a poet, and his
imagination was largely stimulated by copious draughts of bhang and
other intoxicants in which he freely indulged. The consequence was
that he invented several stories discreditable to the Gurus and their
religion. Some of his inventions are due to his exaggerated ideas of
prowess and force in a bad as well as in a good cause--a reflex of the
spirit of the marauding age in which he lived. His statements
accordingly cannot often be accepted as even an approach to history.
[1. The genealogy of Bhâi Gurbakhsh Singh is as follows: Bhâi
Budha, who lived from the time of Guru Nânak to that of Guru Har
Gobind, begot Bhâna, who begot Sarwan, who begot Jalâl, who begot
Jhanda, who begot Gurditta, who begot Bhâi Râm Kanwar (Gurbakhsh
Singh).]
We shall now notice works called Janamsakhis, which profess to be
biographies of Guru Nanak. These compositions were obviously written
at very different epochs after the demise of the Guru, and give very
different and contradictory details of his life. In all of them
miraculous acts and supernatural conversations are recorded. The
question of these Janamsakhis is of such supreme importance, as
showing the extent to which pious fiction can proceed in fabricating
details of the lives of religious teachers,[1] that we must devote
some space to a consideration of them.
One of the most popular Janamsakhis is a large volume of 588 folio
pages lithographed at Lahore. It is plentifully embellished with
woodcuts, and its editor states that in its compilation he has
expended vast pains, having collated books which he had brought from
great distances at vast trouble and expense. He boasts that no one can
produce such a book. If any one dare reprint it without his
permission, he shall be sued and mulcted in damages in a court of
justice. The work is apparently based on Bhai Santokh Singh's Nanak
Parkash.
To gain credence for a biography it is of course necessary to have
a narrator, and to be assured that the narrator is no fictitious
person. In the present, and indeed in all the popular Janamsakhis,
which no doubt have been compiled by altering some one original
volume, a person called Bhai Bala is made the narrator. He is
represented as having been three years younger than Guru Nanak, and as
having accompanied him in the capacity of faithful and confidential
[1. Compare the manner in which Janamsakhis or gospels were
multiplied in the early Christian Church. 'Vast numbers of spurious
writings bearing the names of apostles and their followers, and
claiming more or less direct apostolic authority, were in circulation
in the early Church-Gospels according to Peter, to Thomas, to James,
to Judas, according to the Apostles, or according to the Twelve, to
Barnabas, to Matthias, to Nicodemus, &c.; and ecclesiastical
writers bear abundant testimony to the early and rapid growth of
apocryphal literature.' Supernatural Religion, Vol. i, p. 292. It may
be incidentally mentioned that it was the Gospel according to Barnabas
which Muhammad used in the composition of the Quran.]
attendant in all his wanderings. Bala is said to have dictated the
biography to Paira by order of Guru Angad, the Guru next in succession
to Guru Nanak. What the value of this Janamsakhi is we shall briefly
consider.
It is generally written in the current Panjabi dialect, with a
slight admixture of archaic words, and no more corresponds with the
dialect of the age of Guru Nanak and Guru Angad, whose compositions
have descended to us and can be examined, than the English of the
present day corresponds with that of Chaucer or Piers Plowman. If
Paira wrote from Bala's dictation, where is the original volume, which
of course was written in the language of the time? When Bala proffered
to dictate the biography, Guru Angad, who was well acquainted with
Guru Nanak, knew so little of Bala that he is represented as having
asked him whose disciple he was, and if he had ever seen Nanak. This
does not appear as if Bala, supposing him to have ever existed, had
been an eye-witness of Guru Nanak's deeds, or a trustworthy authority
for the particulars of his life. If he had been, his fitness for the
duty of biographer would have been well known to Guru Angad, who was a
constant companion of Guru Nanak in the end of his life.
In Gur Das's eleventh War is found a list of well-known Sikhs up to
his time. He does not state what Sikhs were converted by or lived in
the time of each Guru. Mani Singh, in the Bhagat Ratanwali, has given
the same list with fuller particulars of the Sikhs. Among them Bhai
Bala is not mentioned. This Janamsakhi professes to have been written
in the Sambat year 1592,[1] when Guru Nanak was still alive, and three
years before Angad had obtained the Guruship. An earlier recension of
the same biography professes to have been written in Sambat 1582, or
thirteen years before the demise of Guru Nanak.
There were three great schisms of the Sikh religion which led to
the falsification of old, or the composition of new Janamsakhis. The
schismatics were known as the Udasis,
[1. The Sambat or Vikramâditya era is fifty-seven years prior to
annus domini.]
the Minas, and the Handalis. The first schism of the Sikhs began
immediately after the demise of Guru Nanak.[1] Some of his followers
adopted Sri Chand, his elder son, as his successor, and repudiated the
nomination of Guru Angad. The followers of Sri Chand were termed
Udasis, or the solitary; and they now constitute a large body of
devout and earnest men. Anand Ghan, one of their number, has in recent
times written the life of Guru Nanak. It contains an apotheosis of Sri
Chand, and states that he was an incarnation of God, and the only true
successor of Guru Nanak.
The second schismatical body of the Sikhs were the Minas. Ram Das,
the fourth Guru, had three sons, Prithi Chand, Mahadev, and Arjan.
Prithi Chand proved unfilial and disobedient, Mahadev became a
religious enthusiast, while Arjan, the youngest, followed in the steps
of his father. To Arjan, therefore, he bequeathed the Guruship. Prithi
Chand he stigmatized as Mina or deceitful, a name given to a robber
tribe in Rajputana. Prithi Chand, however, succeeded in obtaining a
following, whom he warned against association with the Sikhs of Guru
Arjan. Consequently enmity between both sects has existed up to the
present time. Miharban, the son of Prithi Chand, wrote a Janamsakhi of
Guru Nanak in which he glorified his own father. Here there was ample
opportunity for the manipulation of details. It is in this Janamsakhi
of the Minas we first find mention of Bhai Bala.
The Handalis, the third schismatic sect of the Sikhs, were the
followers of Handal, a Jat of the Manjha, who had been converted to
the Sikh religion by Guru Amar Das,
[1. There are now several sects of the religion of Guru Nanak. It
appears from the testimony of St. Paul that the early Christian Church
was similarly divided. 'For it hath been declared unto me of you, my
brethren, by them which are of the house of Chloe, that there are
contentions among you. Now this I say that every one of you saith, I
am of Paul; and I of Apollos; and I of Cephas; and I of Christ. Is
Christ divided? was Paul crucified for you? or were you baptized in
the name of Paul?' (i Cor. i. 11-13). Schisms appear to be the law of
all religions. They began in Islâm after the death of the Prophet's
companions. Islâm, it is said, now numbers seventy three different
sects.]
the third Sikh Guru. Bidhi Chand, a descendant of Handal, was a
Sikh priest at Jandiala, in the Amritsar district. He took unto
himself a Muhammadan woman, whom he attached to him rather by ties of
love than of law, and upon this he was abandoned by his followers.
He then devised a religion of his own, and compiled a Granth and a
Janamsakhi to correspond. In both he sought to exalt to the rank of
chief apostle his father Handal, and degrade Guru Nanak, the
legitimate Sikh Guru. For this purpose creative fancy was largely
employed. To serve the double object of debasing Guru Nanak and
justifying himself to men, he stated that Nanak had also taken unto
himself a Muhammadan woman bound to him by no bonds save those of
lucre and ephemeral affection.
According to this biographer, Guru Nanak, on his journey to Sach
Khand, the true region, or the Land of the Leal, met the Hindu saint
Dhru. One day while on earth Dhru sat on his father's lap, and was
removed by his step-mother. For this trivial slight he left his home
and turned his thoughts to God. God accepted his worship, and in
recognition thereof offered him the highest place in heaven. The pole,
as not moving, is supposed to have the position of honour, and there
Vishnu set him in the centre of the stars. Dhru began to converse with
Guru Nanak, and told him that only one man, Kabir, had previously been
able to visit that select and happy region. Here there was a covert
depreciation of Guru Nanak. Kabir, a famous religious teacher, by
caste a weaver, was his precursor, and the Handali's object was to
show that Guru Nanak was a follower of Kabir and not an original
thinker. Guru Nanak is then represented to have said that a third man,
Handal, was approaching, and would be present in the twinkling of an
eye.
Guru Nanak, proceeds the Handali writer, continued his journey to
Sach Khand, and there found Kabir fanning God, who is represented as
the four-armed Hindu deity Vishnu. A rude drawing in the Handali
Janamsakhi represents God and Kabir in truly anthropomorphic fashion
as a priest and his attendant disciple.
Nanak informed God that he had not fully carried out the orders he
had obtained prior to his departure to earth and his human
manifestation. He had only promulgated God's message in three
directions. The western portion of the world remained still ignorant
and unvisited. He was therefore remanded by God to fully accomplish
his mission. On his return to earth he met in one of the lower worlds
a Jogi with whom, as. was his wont, he entered into familiar
conversation. The Jogi, in reply to Nanak's question, told him that he
had been, in a previous state of existence in the Treta age, a servant
of Raja Janak, King of Mithila, and father-in-law of the renowned
deified hero Ram Chandar. Nanak is made to confess to him that he,
too, had been a servant of Raja Janak, and that they had both served
under, the same roof in the same menial capacity. The Jogi then
questioned Nanak as to his secular position in the Dwapar age. Nanak
is represented as saying with the same unsuspecting frankness that he
had been the son of a teli or oil-presser, a trade held to be
offensive and degrading to Hindus. Thus was the depreciation of Guru
Nanak complete.
Such were the fictitious narratives introduced into the Janamsakhis,
and, the reins of fancy having once been let loose, it was difficult
for the Handalis to know at what goal to pause. The result was a total
transformation of the biographies of Guru Nanak which they had found
in existence. This occurred about the year A.D. 1640. Bidhi Chand died
in the year A.D. 1654. His successor was Devi Das, whom his Musalman
companion bore him.
The Handali heresy was opportune for its followers. Zakaria Khan
Bahadur, the Muhammadan Governor of the Panjab, about a century
afterwards, set a price on the head of every Sikh. At first he offered
twenty-five, then ten, and finally five rupees. The heads of Sikhs
were supplied in abundance by both Musalmans and Hindus,[1]
[1. It was, as we shall subsequently see, a Brâhman who betrayed
the sons of Guru Gobind Singh, and placed them at the disposal of the
Muhammadan Governor of Sarhind, who barbarously murdered them.]
and the price offered was consequently reduced by degrees. The
Handalis protested to the officials of Zakaria that they were not
Sikhs of Nanak, but a totally different sect who merited not
persecution; and in proof of this they pointed to their Granth, and
their Janamsakhi, and to the Musalman companion of Bidhi Chand.
Notwithstanding these subterfuges, the Handalis were subsequently
persecuted and deprived of their land by Maharaja Ranjit Singh, but
they still exist as a small community, whose head quarters are at
Jandiala, where the guardians of their temple enjoy a jagir or fief
from the British Government. They are now .known by the name of
Niranjanie, or followers of the bright God (Niranjan).
In the present age, accustomed as we are to the use and
multiplication of printed books, it is not at once easy to realize how
records of every description could have been forged, altered, and
destroyed in an age when manuscripts only existed. It must be
remembered that books then were few, and that combinations among their
possessors, especially if supported by political power or religious
fanaticism, could easily be effected. The Handalis apparently had
sufficient influence to destroy nearly all the older accounts of the
life: of Guru Nanak.
But, apart from this altogether, there is no doubt that there was a
great destruction of Sikh manuscripts during the persecution of the
Sikh faith by the Muhammadan authorities. Sikh works or treatises
preserved in shrines became special objects of attack. Their existence
was known and could not be denied by the Sikh priests, and systematic
raids were organized to take possession of them. It was only copies
preserved by private individuals, living at a distance from the scenes
of persecution, which had any chance of escape from the fury of the
Moslems.[1]
[1. This finds a parallel in the destruction of Christian writings
by fanatical Romans prior to the time of the Emperor Constantine. The
records of the Christian persecutions show that the Christian priests
who surrendered their sacred writings subsequently received severe
treatment at the hands of their co-religionists. Compare the manner
{footnote p. lxxxiv} in which the Gospel according to the Hebrews, the
Memoirs of the Apostles, and other valuable Christian records used by
the early fathers of the Church, have been destroyed and lost for ever
to the world.]
All the Handali and modem Janamsakhis give Kartik as the month in
which Baba Nanak was born. In Mani Singh's and all the old Janamsakhis
the Guru's natal month is given as Baisakh. The following is the
manner in which Kartik began to be considered as the Guru's natal
month: There lived in the time of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, at Amritsar,
Bhai Sant Singh Gyani, who was held in high estimation by that
monarch. Some five miles from Amritsar is an ancient tank called the Râm
Tirath or place of pilgrimage of the Hindu god Ram. At that place a
Hindu fair was and is still held at the time of the full moon in the
month of Kartik. The spot is essentially Hindu, and it had the further
demerit in the eyes of the Bhai of having been repaired by Lakhpat,
the prime minister of Zakaria Khan Bahadur, the inhuman persecutor of
the Sikhs. Bhai Sant Singh desired to establish an opposition fair in
Amritsar on the same date, and thus prevent the Sikhs from making the
Hindu pilgrimage to Ram Tirath. He gravely adopted the Handali date of
Guru Nanak's birth, and proclaimed that his new fair at Amritsar at
the full moon in the month of Kartik was in honour of the nativity of
the founder of his religion.
There is no doubt that Guru Nanak was born in Baisakh. All the
older Janamsakhis give that as Guru Nanak's natal month. As late as
the Sambat year 1872 it was in Baisakh that the anniversary fair of
Guru Nanak's birth was always celebrated at Nankana. And finally the
Nanak Parkash, which gives the full moon in Kartik, Sambat 1526, as
the time of Guru Nanak's birth and the tenth of the dark half of Assu,
Sambat 1596, as the date of his death, states with strange
inconsistency that he lived seventy years five months and seven
days,[1] a total which is irreconcilable with these dates, but it is
very nearly reconcilable with the date of the Guru's birth given in
the old Janamsakhi.
[1. The usually accepted horoscopes and ages of the Gurus are given
in a work called the Gur Parnâli.]
How the month of Kartik was subsequently ratified by orthodox Sikhs
as the month of Guru Nanak's nativity is also a curious instance of
the manner in which religious anniversaries and observances can be
prescribed and adopted. Bhai Harbhagat Singh, of Shahid Ganj in
Lahore, was a Sikh of high consideration. He long debated in his own
mind whether he would accept Baisakh or Kartik as the month of Guru
Nanak's nativity. At last he submitted the matter to the arbitrament
of chance. He wrote the word Baisakh on one slip of paper and Kartik
on the other, placed both papers in front of the Granth Sahib, and
sent an unlettered boy, who had previously performed religious
ablution in the sacred tank, to take up one of them. The boy selected
the one on which Kartik had been written.[1]
Other reasons, too, for the alterations of the date can easily be
imagined. In the beginning of the month of Baisakh there have been
large Hindu fairs held from time immemorial to celebrate the advent of
spring. These fairs were visited by the early Sikhs as well as by
their Hindu countrymen; and it would on many accounts have been very
inconvenient to make the birth of Guru Nanak synchronize with them.
The comparatively small number of Sikh visitors at a special Sikh fair
in the early days of the Sikh religion would have compared
unfavourably with the large number of Hindu pilgrims at the Baisakhi
fair, and furthermore, the selection of the month of October, when few
Hindu fairs are held, and when the weather is more suitable for the
distant journey to Nankana, would probably lead to a large gathering
of Hindus at a Sikh shrine.
One difference of opinion among the victims of priestcraft is apt
to produce many. When the month of Kartik was adopted by the Handalis
as Guru Nanak's birth time, a discussion arose as to whether it was
the lunar or the solar
[1. In the East sacred books are often employed in this way for
purposes of divination. In the Middle Ages the Bible, and in earlier
times the poems of Homer, Virgil, and others, were used for the same
purpose.]
Kartik, there being a considerable difference between these forms
of chronology. The partisans of the lunar Kartik, however, prevailed,
the lunar month being the earlier form of calculation, and
consequently the most acceptable to all persons whose religion is
based on any form of Hinduism, Generally the confusion of solar and
lunar chronology is the cause of much perplexity and qualms of
conscience to the pious.[1]
The last Janamsakhi which we shall notice was written by a Sikh
called Sewa Das.[2] Of this we have obtained several copies. One of
them in our possession bears the date Sambat 1645 = A.D. 1588. It was
therefore completed at least sixteen years before the compilation of
the Granth Sahib by Guru Arjan, which is admitted to have taken place
in A.D. 1604. Its language is that of Pothohar, the country between
the Jihlam and the Indus, and its written character is unmistakably
more ancient than that of any other Gurumukhi book now in existence.
This Janamsakhi appears to have escaped the notice of both Gur Das
and Mani Singh. Had Gur Das seen it, he would doubtless have given a
fuller account of the life of Guru Nanak; and, had it been known to
Mani Singh, he would probably have referred to it or criticized its
details. While persecutions of the Sikhs were raging south of Lahore,
and the other detailed memoirs of Guru Nanak's life, including those
of Bhai Mani Singh, were destroyed, this Janamsakhi was preserved in
Pothohar, where Moslem bigotry. was not then aggressively exercised.
In this biography there is no mention whatever of Bhai
[1. The late Bhâi Gurumukh Singh, who first gave the author these
details, afterwards put himself at the head of a deputation to move
the Government of the Panjâb to declare the fictitious anniversary of
Guru Nânak's birth a public holiday. That Government accordingly
added a second Sikh holiday to the already long list of Christian,
Hindu, and Muhammadan holidays sanctioned in its calendar. The other
special Sikh holiday is the Hola Mahalla, the day on which the tenth
Guru held a mimic battle for the instruction of his troops.
2. The late Sir Atar Singh, Chief of Bhadaur, gave the author this
information.]
{p. xxxvii}
Bala. There is, however, mention made of Mardana, who undoubtedly
accompanied Baba Nanak as his minstrel in most, if not all, of his
wanderings. This Janamsakhi again is deformed by mythological matter
which Baba Nanak himself would have been the first to repudiate.
Notwithstanding exaggerations, such as occur in all religions which
deal with avatars or incarnations, the Janamsakhi now under
consideration is beyond dispute the most trustworthy detailed record
we possess of the life of Guru Nanak. It contains much less
mythological matter than any other Gurumukhi life of the Guru, and is
a much more rational, consistent, and satisfactory narrative. At the
same time it is, of course, the product of legend and tradition, but
these have, in at least one memorable instance, been thought more
trustworthy than written records in such cases.[1] We shall make this
ancient Janamsakhi the basis of our own details of the life of Guru
Nanak[2], supplementing it when necessary by cullings from the later
lives of the Guru. At the same time we must premise that several of
the details of this and of all the current Janamsakhis appear to us to
be simply settings for the verses and sayings of Guru Nanak. His
followers and admirers found dainty word-pictures in his compositions.
They considered under what circumstances they could have been
produced, and thus devised the framework of a biography in which to
exhibit them to the populace.
The deeds that have been done, the prophecies that have been
uttered, and the instruction that has been imparted by that great
procession of holy men, the Sikh Gurus, will be found described in the
following pages. In the Gurus the East shook off the torpor of ages,
and unburdened itself
[1. Papias, a father of the Christian Church, who flourished about
A.D. 130, wrote that he considered what he obtained from the living
and abiding voice of men would profit him more in obtaining accurate
details of the life of Christ than what was recorded in the gospels.
2. That accomplished Sikh scholar and saintly man, the late Bhâi
Dit Singh, has also made the Janamsakhi that we use the basis of his
Gurumukhi life of Guru Nânak.]
of the heavy weight of ultra-conservatism which had paralysed the
genius and intelligence of its people. Only those who know India by
actual experience can adequately appreciate the difficulties the Gurus
encountered in their efforts to reform and awaken the sleeping nation.
Those who, secure in their own wisdom and infallibility, and
dwelling apart from the Indian people spurn all knowledge of their
theological systems, and thus deem Sikhism a heathen religion, and the
spiritual happiness and loyalty of its followers negligeable items,
are men whose triumph shall be short-lived and whose glory shall not
descend with the accompaniment of minstrel raptures to future
generations. I am not without hope that when enlightened rulers become
acquainted with the merits of the Sikh religion they will not
willingly let it perish in the great abyss in which so many creeds
have been engulfed.
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