The Guru Granth Sahib

The Guru Granth Sahib

by W Owen Cole

Woman reading scriptures in the gurdwara

Woman reading the
scriptures in the gurdwara

The Guru Granth Sahib is the name of the primary Sikh scripture. It is so highly respected by Sikhs that the honorific title 'Sahib' is usually appended to it, therefore it is popularly known as the Guru Granth Sahib.

In an article on Sikhism written for the general reader comparisons with other religions would not be made, and are seldom helpful. However, in a book to be read ma'mly by Christians it might be appropriate to say that the Guru Granth Sahib is for Sikhs what Jesus is for Christians, i.e. the Word of God. Though Sikhs respect the messengers, the human Gurus, the teaching they delivered, the liberating Word, is of far more significance. It is found in the Guru Granth Sahib which contains the compositions revealed to the first six Gurus and the ninth Guru, as well as some other material.

Sikhism is a revealed religion and not a human creation. It is most definitely not a syncretism of Islam and Hinduism devised by its human founder, Guru Nanak and his nine successors. Guru Nanak felt called to preach God's spiritually liberating Word to all his contemporaries, notably the lowest of the low and poorest of the poor who lay beyond the ministrations of the Brahmin Hindus, and to women who had no hope of liberation until they were born as men. These people could turn to Islam and many Punjabi men and women did. However, this entailed leaving family and community traditions if they converted unless they changed their allegiance as part of a mass movement. One could, however, remain a Sikh without having to embrace a culture which was alien even to the point of using Arabic in prayers and submitting to the spiritual leadership of men who were not usually Indian by ancestry. The Sikh community was Punjabi in every respect, even to the extent of using the everyday language of the region. In those days Sikhism offered spiritual liberation without making any cultural demands.

Guru Nanak taught in Punjabi, though the bani, the metrical poems which he uttered, are in a more broadly based language used by many other similar preachers in north India at the tirne. When the verses were written down, late in his lifetime or during the leadership of his successor, the script used was gurmukhi, the one used in Punjab today. This has served to increase the association of Sikhism with the Punjab region of India. Methodists and Scottish users of the metrical version of the Psalms will especially appreciate the fact that Sikhlsm was born in song. Verse is easy to remember. With his Muslim friend Mardana, who played a stringed, lute-like instrument called a rebeck which had been given to him by the Guru's sister, Guru Nanak travelled throughout the Punjab wining disciples. The word 'Sikh' in Puniabi means'disciple'. Often Guru Nanak would make use of compositions already created, sometimes he would speak as the occasion inspired him. Thus at the siege of Saidpur, where he was taken captive by the invading Mughals, he angrily denounced thedestruction of the city and the suffering caused by Babur, the future Emperor.

I proclaim the tidings which I have received from the Lord, 0 beloved. From Kabul he (Babur) has descended with sin as his marriage bed and forcibly demanded a dowry, 0 beloved-Modesty and sacred duty have gone into hiding, and falsehood struts around as lord, 0 beloved. The writ of the Qazi and Brahmin no longer runs; (in their place) it is Satan who reads the marriage ceremony, 0 beloved. In their agony Muslim women read the Qur'an and cry (for help) to God, 0 beloved. And I find women both (high) caste and low, they too sufrer the same violation, 0 beloved. It is a wedding-sound of blood which is sung, Nanak, and blood is the saffron wherewith they are anointed, 0 beloved.

These words are from the B40 Janam Sakhi, a religious biography of Guru Nanak translated by Professor W.H. McLeod, a leading authority on the Sikh religion. They are to be found on pages 722-723 of the Guru Granth Sahib. Some accounts of Guru Nanak's life describe him carrying a pothi, a pocket book of hymns, on a visit to Mecca. This may well have been an anthology of his verses, which number 974 in the Guru Granth Sahib. There are also some unauthenticated compositions in various Janam Sakhis.

It was clear that Guru Nanak's work was far from complete when he died. He felt constrained to appoint and install a successor, called Lehna, to whom he gave the name Angad, which means'my limb'. This symbolised what Sikh writers said: the light remains the same, only the body has changed. Guru Angad composed few hymns, only 62. His achievement was the consolidation of his master's work. The third, fourth and fifth Gurus were far more prolific. They wrote 907, 679, and 2218 hymns respectively. By 1604 the bani comprised almost 5,000 poems.

1604 is a significant date in the history of the Guru Granth Sahib. It was then when Guru Adan, the fifth Guru, supervised a compilation of these verses, the Pothi Sahib, now better known as the Adi Granth. The book was compiled at Amritsar near what is now called the Golden Temple. Bhai Gurdas, a member of the Guru's family, was the amanuensis. Guru Aijan checked every word that he wrote. When the task was completed he took the Adi Granth into the worship centre, the Hammdir Sahib, installed it, and made obeisance to it. In this way he acknowledged it to be superior to himself, as it contained the Word of God. The original copy survives to this day.

The name Adi Granth is used to distinguish the 1604 collection from one made by the tenth Guru in which he added the compositions of his father, Guru Tegh Bahadur, locating them immediately after those of the fifth Guru. However, Adi' can mean 'first' in the cardinal sense, the'original'. Tehle' is the word used to mean the first of a series. Adi' often describes the original teacher in a Hindu order, frequently Brahman, God. Adi' might therefore have theological significance. Certainly Sikhs believe that the Adi Granth contains the eternal Word of God. It is their supreme source of spiritual nourishment. At the end of the Granth, Guru Aijanan wrote, comparing it to a delicious thali with which many of us are familiar:

In the platter 'thali' are placed three things, truth, contentment and meditation. The nectar-name of God, the support of all has also been put therein. If someone eats his food, if some one relishes it, that person is emancipated. This can not be forsaken so keep it enshrined in your mind always. Falling down at Gods feet the dark world ocean is crossed. 0 Nanak, everything is an extension of the One. AG, i.e. Adi Granth, 1429.

A G is the usual way of referring to the page of a scripture quotation.

Unwrapping and reading the Guru Granth Sahib

One significant feature of the Sikh scripture is the bhagat bani. It is is a collection of material composed by such men as Kabir, who refused to describe himself as Hindu or Muslim, Sheikh Farid who was a Muslim Sufi, Ravidas who was a cobbler whose birth placed him outside the structures of Hiduism, and Ramanand who was a famous Brahmin guru. The presence of compositions by people who were clearly not members of the faith is distinctive of Sikhism. Its theological significance, Sikhs point out, is to say that the Word is not restricted to any one group. As Guru Nanak said, 'God is neither Hindu nor Muslim so whose path shall I follow? I shall follow God's path'. It would seem logical therefore to include non-Sikh writings which accord with Sikh teaching in their holy book. Interestingly, and perhaps again significantly, the distinctive scriptures of other faiths are not included, for example passages from the Qur'an and the Vedas. This would have led immediately to an erroneous charge that the Sikh religion lacks any originality of its own.

In 1708 the tenth master, Guru Gobind Singh, decreed on his death bed that there would be no other human Gurus. He made obeisance to the Adi Granth and declared it to be the Guru, hence the name Guru Granth Sahib.

Since that time Sikh individuals, sangats or congregations, the Panth or full community, should take major decisions only after deliberating upon the issue in the presence of the Guru Granth Sahib. This will often involve studying its teachings. Sometimes a randomly taken passage will be taken, called a vak, and accepted as guidance. Such a decision, reached after prayerful consideration, is called a gurmatta.

The printing press entered Punjab with Christian missionaries in 1834, but it was about another fifty years before the Guru Granth Sahib was allowed to be printed. It was longer still before printed copies were accepted for use in Sikh places of worship. There were also several printed versions in circulation. Eventually, well into the twentieth century, the Sikh Panth officially declared that a 1430 page edition should be the one used by the community. It is to be found in gurdwaras world wide. This is of great convenience to sangats and scholars who, instead of trying to find a passage within one of the 31 sections into which the Guru Granth Sahib was divided by Guru Arjan, can now simply use page references!

The true importance of the Guru Granth Sahib can be seen most clearly and easily during a visit to a gurdwara at the time of worship. its spiritual qualities can best be experienced by reading some of the bani. An easily accessible translation is that by Nikky Gurinder Kaur Singh in The Name of My Beloved, which is listed in the bibliography.

DASAM GRANTH

A word must be said about another book, the Dasam Granth. Guru Gobind Singh did not include any of his compositions in the Guru Granth Sahib. They were collected some years after his death by one of his companions, Bhai Mani Singh, who completed the exercise in 1734. 'The contents of the Dasam Granth vary considerably in quality and purpose. Some were produced to lift the morale of Sikhs as they faced the Mughals 'm intermittent Conflicts. Others were deeply spiritual and are used in Sikh ceremonies, especially Amrit Sanskar, the act of initiation into the Khalsa.. Me Dasam Granth, meaning book of the tenth Guru, is scripture and may be used in gurdwaras but the present writer knows of no one who has actually seen it installed in the way in which the Guru Granth Sahib is. No completed English version exists, but much of it was translated by Macauliffe in the Sikh Religion, which is listed in the bibliography.

The gold palaquin containing the Guru Granth Sahib. It is being read and as it passes people bow

Granth in procession