Gems of Gurbani

Art of living – 2

The fine balances of ethical values have to become the part of one’s art of living in human societies in a larger perspective. The religion plays a great role in making of such societies provided the religion teaches tolerance for the otherwise thinking societies or religions that would live parallel and stop provocation or hatred. In the time contemporary to Guru Nanak a wide communication gap, intolerance and hatred existed between Hindus and Muslims. The power, wealth and religious zealots from central Asia and Arabia started pouring in India as invaders and created havoc by using brutal force to establish themselves. The Hindu society hated them and called them Malechh – untouchables. The invaders who used brutal force and banished and humiliated the natives of India became egocentric and thought only if everyone becomes Muslim he is worth keeping company. The fact that Guru Nanak realized was that the human being who are created by the same Creator could become so distant to each other and that was all because of the people who took over the charge of religion assumed that God has given them this power and now it is up to them to wield their power and keep the Creation separated. In this power greedy status all the religious heads, Kings, rich class people become one and play with the emotions of the people. By retaining power and by playing the show of conservatism the power hungry heads refrain people to learn from the real values for the art of living. For retaining the power position the heads of religions, political states do not like to delegate power to all others who may be equally interested in the proper development of the society and which may be beneficial to the society at large. This way the religions are institutionalized and no scope for contributions by the welfare oriented are left. Guru Nanak who was born as an enlightened soul realized the truth in his childhood but to confirm and consolidate his convictions he took several travels to get firsthand experience of the state of people in India and Asia. His teachings which he expresses in his poetry of the contemporary style and his collection of the verses of poets from 12 th century onwards are all enshrined in Guru Granth Sahib. The prevalent language in which the verses of Granth Sahib are written is called Sant bhasha or santukdi. Grammatically it is difficult and different from modern Punjabi and there is mixture of other languages like Farsi, Arabic, Marathi, Brij etc. The poets whose verses he collected from all over India were actually reformers who had realized the same truth as Guru Nanak but unfortunately didn’t have the vision of Guru Nanak to travel and spread the truth more vehemently. They remained in their small geographical sphere and were brutalized by the Rulers for raising a voice of freedom and truth. Guru Nanak had another advantage that he belonged to the so called high caste of Kshatriyas and his excellence in debating about the matter of religions, state of people and country, his analytical power, his courage to admonish rulers, jogis, Kazi or mullah, Brahmin or priests and even God were so strong that his gaze alone was enough to make people speechless when he argued.

To continue…..