Chapter 93. Bhakti, the Sants and the Sikh Panth: From Devotional Revolt to the Khalsa and Its Politics

Bhakti, devotional love of a personal God sung in the vernacular, began in Tamil country and moved north over the next thousand years. It challenged Brahmin ritual and Sanskrit learning, and in the north it met Islamic Sufism. Out of that meeting, in the Punjab of the late fifteenth century, came Guru Nanak and the community (panth) of his disciples, the Sikhs. Within two centuries the community had a scripture, a holy city and a series of martyrs. In 1699 it acquired an armed initiatory order, the Khalsa. This chapter follows the line from the Tamil singer-saints to the Sikh kingdom, the colonial era, partition and 1984.

Bhakti: from the Tamil saints to the northern sants

The Encyclopedia of World History notes that “the word bhakti is derived from a Sanskrit word for ‘sharing.'” It states that “bhakti movements combined songs (bhajan) with devotion. Two groups of singer-saints, the Alvars and the Nayanars, flourished in South India after the 600s” [Encyclopedia of World History, #5204, “bhakti movements”]. Alain Daniélou assigns them their gods. “The Alvars, the Vaishnavite saints of the south, had already produced a vast mystical literature in Tamil, which came to exercise a great influence on Indochina and Indonesia,” while “the Nayannars, other Tamil saints who were Shaivite,” carried the same mysticism into Shaiva worship. “In the north, Chaitanya, Kabir, Mirabai, Surdas, and others are famous examples” [Daniélou, Shiva and the Primordial Tradition, #67683, “The Shaivite Revival”].

Mirabai (1498–1546) shows the social radicalism of the movement. The library’s collection describes her as “an aristocratic Hindu mystical singer and devotee of Lord Krishna from Rajasthan.” She “danced from one village to another village,” and one story places her “in the company of Kabir in Kashi, once again causing affront to social mores” [Mirabai, Mirabai (poems), #53913, biographical note]. Her verses state the break with family duty directly: “What I paid was my social body, my town body, my family body, and all my inherited jewels. Mirabai says: The Dark One is my husband now” [ibid.].

Nanak and the succession of the ten Gurus

Khushwant Singh’s A History of the Sikhs gives Nanak’s dates as 1469–1539. He was “the son of a petty official living in a village some thirty miles from Lahore.” He “took to studying the Hindu and Muslim religions almost from his boyhood” and argued constantly with “itinerant holy men.” Nine Gurus followed him. “Succession was not determined by the prevailing laws of inheritance, but with the object of finding a teacher most fitted to safeguard and develop the spiritual legacy left by Nanak… one Guru succeeded the other ‘as one lamp lights another'” [Singh, A History of the Sikhs vol. 1, #68754, ch. 1]. A. Mandair’s chapter in Sorajjakool’s handbook credits Nanak with the langar (communal kitchen), Amardas (1497–1574) with separate Sikh shrines and festivals, and Ramdas (1534–1581) with the new centre that became Amritsar [Mandair, in Sorajjakool, World Religions for Healthcare Professionals, #35015, “Sikhism”].

What is Sikhism? The origins controversy

The sources disagree sharply. Khushwant Singh, himself a Sikh, writes: “Guru Nanak, the founder of the Sikh religion, was a Hindu; so were the nine succeeding Gurus. Guru Nanak tried, like his contemporary reformers, to prune Hinduism of the many pernicious practices which were corroding Hindu society. His inspiration was essentially Hindu. The ideas were, of necessity, borrowed from Islam, the only other religion available for scrutiny” [Singh, vol. 1, #68754, ch. 13, “The Future”]. He places Sikhism as an “offshoot” of the Bhakti movement, sharing “much in common” with the Muslim Sufis [ibid., ch. 12]. He adds that “tendencies to revert to the Hindu fold had become stronger as the Sikhs attained temporal power. By the time of Ranjit Singh, Hinduism had practically come back into its own” [Singh, vol. 1, #68754].

Devotional Sikh authors present Nanak as the bearer of a new revelation. Sumeet Aurora’s Nanak: The Correspondent of the Ultimate builds its life of the Guru on the Janamsakhi hagiographies. The fourth of these is “associated to Bhai Mani Singh,” whom “the Sikhs of the time urged… to bring up an authentic portrayal of the life of Guru Nanak.” Aurora’s reading list sets these traditions beside the critical scholarship of McLeod (Guru Nanak and the Sikh Religion, 1968), Grewal and Macauliffe [Aurora, Nanak, #75482, “Select Bibliography”]. Kirpal Singh’s commentary on the Jap Ji stresses Naam and the Satguru (true master) over communal identity. It quotes Nanak: “Hindu temples and the mosques of the Muslims are all the same,” and “to him whose delusion of the mind is gone, Hindu and Muslim are alike” [Kirpal Singh, The Jap Ji, #44978, Introduction].

The Granth, the Mughals and the martyr Gurus

“The compilation of the Granth Sahib was largely the work of the fifth Guru Arjun and his disciple, Gurdas.” It “contains the writings of the first five Gurus, the ninth Guru, Tegh Bahadur, and a couplet by Guru Gobind Singh. A large part of the book consists of the writings of Hindu and Muslim saints of the time, chiefly those of the Muslim Kabir” [Singh, vol. 1, #68754, ch. 2].

The nineteenth-century missionary D. M. Thornton, relying on the German Indologist Ernest Trumpp, is hostile. He writes that some contributors were “personal flatterers of Guru Arjan, whose writings are quite valueless.” He also writes that “Govind tried to procure the original book of the Adi Granth, as drawn up by Guru Arjan, in order to introduce into it a more martial spirit” [Thornton, Parsi, Jaina and Sikh, #55051, citing Trumpp, Adi Granth, pp. cxx–cxxi]. After Arjan, Thornton says, “the work of the teacher was now in great measure transferred to the guardians of the sacred volume.” “But the ninth Guru, Teg-Bahadur, attracted the attention of the fanatical Emperor Aurangzib” [ibid.]. Mandair puts the turn in political terms: “The Sikh Panth’s involvement in political resistance came to a climax with the tenth guru, Gobind Singh (1666–1708)” [Mandair, in Sorajjakool, #35015].

The Khalsa of 1699

Khushwant Singh writes that Gobind “realized that a change in ideology was necessary… If his followers were to be saved from extinction, they had not only to be taught the use of arms but also convinced of the morality of the use of force.” He quotes the Guru: “When all other means have failed, it is righteous to draw the sword” [Singh, vol. 1, #68754, ch. 1]. “On the Hindu new year’s day in 1699, Gobind Singh assembled his followers and initiated five of them, known as Punj Piyaras, the Five Beloved, into a new fraternity.” The five kakkas (“unshorn hair, comb, steel bangle, shorts and sword”) “were introduced by Guru Gobind Singh on the Hindu new year’s day in 1699, when he raised the militant Khalsa from the pacifist Sikh” [ibid., chs. 1, 13]. Wikipedia names the first Panj Pyare as Daya Singh, Dharam Singh, Himmat Singh, Mohkam Singh and Sahib Singh, initiated at Anandpur on 30 March 1699 [Wikipedia: Panj Pyare]. Mandair notes that initiates abandoned family surnames, men taking “Singh (literally, lion)” and women “Kaur (meaning princess).” The Guru “in turn received the same initiation from the panj piare,” a “merger of identities between the guru and disciple” [Mandair, in Sorajjakool, #35015]. Thornton’s verdict is: “From the moment of initiation the Sikh became a soldier, and the holy war his permanent occupation. He was not even to return a salute from a Hindu” [Thornton, #55051].

Kingdom, annexation and the colonial Panth

The second volume of Khushwant Singh’s history covers 1839–2004. It describes the disorder after Ranjit Singh’s death, with intrigue among the Dogra brothers; “Gulab Singh Dogra refused to send in revenue and incited” revolt. It follows the two Anglo-Sikh wars and the annexation of 1849. On annexation he reports that Mahajan and Ganda Singh accuse Dalhousie “of deliberately misrepresenting the facts” that he gave as grounds [Singh, A History of the Sikhs vol. 2, #64452, Parts I–II].

Under British rule, religion and the army became bound together. After the Mutiny the army recruited Sikhs “beyond all proportion to their numbers” and insisted that recruits be “Kesadhari (the Khalsa with unshorn locks)” [Singh, vol. 1, #68754, ch. 5]. On the Hindu new year of 1857 Ram Singh, “following the precedent of Guru Gobind Singh, baptized five of his disciples” as the Namdharis (Kukas) [ibid.]. A Kuka prophecy foretold “the rebirth of Guru Gobind Singh in the person of one Ram Singh, carpenter of village Bhaini, who would resurrect the Khalsa, drive the English out of Hindustan.” From prison Ram Singh “sent an emissary to Russia to elicit help.” The Kukas claimed nearly a million members in 1871, but the 1891 census counted 10,541 [Singh, vol. 2, #64452, Part III]. The loyalist current took the opposite course. “On 5 March 1892, the lieutenant governor, Sir James Lyall… laid the foundation stone of the Khalsa College at Amritsar” [ibid.]. The Chief Khalsa Diwan pressed “separation from the Hindus, which, in political terminology, meant separate rights and reservation of seats” [Singh, vol. 1, #68754, ch. 10].

Akalis, partition and 1984

According to Wikipedia, the Akali movement (1920–1925) sought to take the gurdwaras from hereditary mahants and government managers. It took control of the Golden Temple and Akal Takht in October 1920, and it ended with the Sikh Gurdwara Bill of 1925, which placed the historic shrines under the elected SGPC [Wikipedia: Akali movement]. Partition in 1947 divided the Sikh homeland. Ramachandra Guha records that in Delhi “the Hindu and Sikh refugees from Pakistan were baying for blood” [Guha, India After Gandhi, #65134]. The Akali Dal’s Punjabi Suba campaign, led by Master Tara Singh, rested on his conviction that “the Sikh religion will live only as long as the Sikh panth exists as an organized entity.” It produced the Punjabi-speaking state of 1966, with Haryana and Chandigarh split off [Wikipedia: Punjabi Suba movement].

The Anandpur Sahib Resolution of 1973 and Bhindranwale’s Dharam Yudh Morcha (1982) led to Operation Blue Star, 1–10 June 1984 [Wikipedia: 1984 anti-Sikh riots; Wikipedia: Operation Blue Star]. Mark Tully calls it “the Indian army’s clumsy attack on the Sikh Golden Temple,” which “deeply wounded the pride of the Sikhs” and “gave them a martyr” for the Khalistan cause [Tully, No Full Stops in India, #62943, “Operation Black Thunder”]. Casualty figures for Blue Star vary widely. The government White Paper gave 493 dead, independent estimates run to several thousand, and human-rights groups put the total at more than 10,000 [Wikipedia: Operation Blue Star]. Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her Sikh bodyguards, and the pogroms that followed killed about 2,800 Sikhs in Delhi and 3,350 nationwide by government estimate, with other estimates of 8,000–17,000. The CBI believes the violence “was organised with support from the Delhi police and some central-government officials,” and the Akal Takht calls it genocide [Wikipedia: 1984 anti-Sikh riots].

A note on fringe use of Sikh sources: Michael Tellinger’s Romanian-translated Sclavii zeilor (vol. 2) reproduces the formal definition of a Sikh. This is anyone who firmly believes in “one Immortal Being,” the ten Gurus, the Guru Granth Sahib and the baptism of the tenth Guru, and owes allegiance to no other religion. Tellinger quotes Granth passages as evidence for his thesis that the Anunnaki “gods” ruled early humanity [Tellinger, Sclavii zeilor vol. 2, #17919].

Key points

• Bhakti (“sharing”) began with the Tamil Alvars (Vishnu) and Nayanars (Shiva) after the 600s and spread north with Kabir, Mirabai, Surdas and Chaitanya.
• Nanak (1469–1539) was followed by nine Gurus chosen for fitness, not by inheritance, “as one lamp lights another.”
• Khushwant Singh holds that all ten Gurus were Hindus who reformed Hinduism with ideas borrowed from Islam; devotional authors (Aurora, Kirpal Singh) present a new revelation that transcends both.
• The Adi Granth holds the first five Gurus, Tegh Bahadur, a couplet of Gobind and much of Kabir; Thornton, following Trumpp, dismisses parts as “flatterers” and accuses Gobind of seeking to militarise the text.
• The Khalsa of 1699 (Panj Pyare, five Ks, Singh and Kaur) “raised the militant Khalsa from the pacifist Sikh”; Thornton calls holy war its “permanent occupation.”
• Colonial rule bound Sikh identity to the army, millenarian revolt (the Kukas) and loyalist institutions (the Khalsa College, 1892).
• The twentieth century ran from the Akali gurdwara campaign and partition through the Punjabi Suba (1966) to Operation Blue Star, Indira Gandhi’s assassination and the 1984 pogroms.