february/march 2000

We are going to celebrate Vaisakhi soon. The significance of Vaisakhi does not stop at the Amrit sanchaar. It is the day when Guru Ji revealed God's plan for mankind. It is the day when Guru Ji gave power to the people. It is the day when Guru Ji revealed the Khalsa Panth. It is the day when Guru Ji bowed before a new kind of Guru, the people, the Guru Khalsa Panth. It is the day when Guru Ji instituted an initiation ceremony for an individual to subsume his identity and be part of the Panth, and thus submit to the collective will of the Guru Khalsa Panth.

Those who choose not to do so, live by their own individual rules which makes one a manmukh, or the rules laid down by their individual master which makes one a bemukh, as opposed to a gurmukh who lives in the will of the Guru.

It is the day when Guru Ji brought to light the quote from Japji Sahib "panch parwan panch pardhan" by declaring that panj pyare will operationalise the Guru jugat that is in the Guru Khalsa Panth. It is also the day when about 230 years earlier Mata Tripta was gave birth to dhan dhan Guru Nanak Dev Ji.

This day then is the Parkaash Diharra of the Guru Khalsa Panth (the physical, the jugat). It is also the Gurgadhi Diharra of the Guru Khalsa Panth. We need to celebrate it as such. Once the spirit of the Panth lights up within us, then all confusion will vanish.

Hola Mohalla is an annual festival that celebrates health and freedom. Physical prowess and strength, strategic decision-making, tactical manoeuvres, group dynamics, mastery of weapons and other skills are tested in mock-battles and games. The Khalsa is reminded of its duty to uphold truth and justice protect the creation of Waheguru and be ever ready to defend the downtrodden.

We celebrate this festival with lectures in the Gurdwaras, rehn sebaaee kirtan smagams, gatka displays, maybe some games for children and leave it at that. How are we making this festival relevant in contemporary times? Relevant to the youth of today? Relevant to the other communities?

What programmes do we have to promote good health? Freedom?

Is the truth and justice that the Khalsa is reminded to uphold limited to the troubles facing the Panth in Punjab? Or beyond?

How are we protecting the creation of Waheguru?
And what are we doing to defend the downtrodden of the world?

What are the challenges facing the Khalsa that the Khalsa must be prepared to face today? What ‘weapons’ does the Khalsa need to meet these challenges? What are these weapons that the Khalsa must master?

What does the Khalsa need the physical prowess and strength for? To fight amongst its own members? Or to challenge world Olympic records, carry out charitable work in challenging environments, etc?

Why does the Khalsa need to sharpen ‘strategic decision making skills’? What strategies? What decisions?

Maybe we need to work in groups and teams instead of individually?. And should not the development of these skills be an on-going affair all
year round? And the Hola Mohalla be a ‘Sikh Olympics’ with these kinds of events?

Celebrate health and freedom…

Autar Singh

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This is arguably one of the first Sikh teachings. Tradition says that when Guru Nanak re-appeared after having apparently drowned in the River Beas, the first statement he made was “Nai Koi Hindu, na Musalman”.

Guru Nanak saw that these words are really just manmade labels that don’t go with one after this life. He saw into the real souls of people, and not the barriers, defense-mechanisms, buttresses, and prides people had set up for themselves. There is no Hindu or Muslim!

Furthermore, if a real God-sent Guru were to come to Punjab again today, I think he would say, "There is no Hindu, Muslim, or Sikh". In the same tradition and meaning. Because one should not use labels, but see beyond that to what one truly and really is. No "names" or labels will save you or support you hereafter. You cant hide behind them in front of Dharam Raia.

When God sees you, he sees the soul, the part of Him He broke off of from himself, and planted in that body. He recognizes no names. Similarly when Dharam Raia sees you after this life, he sees no names either. He only sees your soul, with all of the actions you’ve done written on it. By this he judges, and not by any "title" of job, vocation, or religion that man has set. He sees through all of this, so we should too.

Then of course someone is going to ask, "Well then why call yourself a Sikh, or keep your hair?" The answer is that there is a flip side to the statement of "there is no Hindu, and no Muslim."

There IS a Sikh, Hindu, and Muslim, if you are absolutely true to your creed, and become that which your religion tells you to be. With no hypocrisy. That is what we should strive to be. The 5 Ks help you in this life, and help you to better your ACTIONS in this life, so you may be better judged hereafter. A person of any faith who has lived his/her life cleanly, is better off than a person who has uncut hair but is full of greed. The first will be better off in the hereafter than the second. The ideal is of course, to marry the two. To be of long hair, 5 Ks, and of the best exemplary action, love, and compassion. That's excellence according to Sikhism.

So the 5 Ks as per this argument, are tools to help you live a cleaner life. No one who doesn't have long hair should be afraid of or "hate" people who do have long hair, but should see that those people should be striving to better themselves beyond the ordinary man. Keshadharis don't hate short haired Sikhs. At least I don't.

"Na koi hindu, na musalman, nor any non-God people. We are all souls."

This is really a transcendental statement by one who saw beyond all things earthly, to their real essence. He wasn't fooled by anyone.

This statement cannot be understood by reasoning. It has to be understood by experience. The best way to understand what Guru Nanak meant by "Na koi Hindu Na Musalman", is to leave all else, and sit in quiet seclusion by the seashore for a few moments. Sit there cross legged, and close your eyes and meditate. Sitting straight, release all thoughts of the world. Release everything. Let go of all your attachments of EVERYTHING. Be at peace. Release it all. Everything you have ever known in the world. Think of nothing else, and know nothing else, and be nothing else. Release the entire world from within you.

Then sit for a minute more with no thoughts in your mind. Then open your eyes and see out into the wonderful sea. You should see nothing but God Himself. Nothing but him. At that moment you will know that nothing else really exists but God Himself, and that all else is false. "It doesn't really exist." You will know that the world is maya. An illusion. God is really all that exists!

At that moment you should know that God is all that really is. You should be laughing at yourself. You should know that everything that man has ever conjured up in the world has no meaning. And that God is all there is.

You should also see that all that man does is wrong, and false. That knowing God is the only way. Then one should bow his head toward God and receive pilgrimage of the True Guru (God Himself).

Sitting there one should unsee all else, and only See Him. And thereby realize the true values of life. At that point one may even have the realization that he has lived his life all wrong. That one has been attached to all in the world, and has been "duped" by man and his labels.

It is then that one understands the meaning of "Na koi hindu na musalman." Not only that but one sees that ALL is false, and only God is wondrous. This is a state of detachment. Only in evolving above the world does one truly understand that meaning.

It cant be understood by any amount of thinking. Rather one has to let go all "thinking" in order to see it. One doesn't see the true message of the seers until one unsees all else.

"Wah Wah Wah" is what one should be filled with at that point. One's face should be smiling.

The Gurbani in Sri Guru Granth Sahib was all written in a state of absolute transcendence. Transcendence isn’t a word from another religion. It means detachment, and realizing God as the essence, exactly as Gurbani teaches.

I am saying this because I have found myself saying the exact same sentiment as expressed by that phrase, in reference to other things, many many times. Because I see that there is nothing but God. It /He can be realized by His Grace, and by no other way.

And that state of detachment of knowing nothing but He is what is mentioned many times in Guru Granth Sahib. Gurus minds were in God Himself, even though their feet walked on the ground.

Mohinderjeet Singh.

Waheguru is the distinctive name of the Supreme Being in the Sikh dispensation, like Yahweh in Judaism and Allah in Islam. In Sikh scripture, the Guru Granth Sahib, the term Waheguru does not figure in the compositions of the Sikh Gurus, though it occurs therein, both as Vahiguru and Vahguru , in the hymns of Bhatt Gayand, the bard contemporary with Guru Arjan, and also in the Varan of Bhai Gurdas. Guru Gobind Singh used Vaheguru in the invocatory formula - Eke Ongkaar Sri Vaheguru Ji Ki Fateh, beside the traditional Ik Ongkaar Satgur Parsaad at the beginning of some of his compositions as well as in the Sikh salutation - Waheguru Ji Ka Khalsa Waheguru Ji Ki Fateh, varied as Sri Waheguru Ji Ki Fateh.

Modern scholars, affirm that the name Waheguru is owed originally to the Gurus, most likely to the founder of the faith, Guru Nanak, himself. Waheguru is a compound of two words, one from Persian and the other from Sanskrit, joined in a symbolic relationship to define the indefinable, indescribable Ultimate Reality. ‘Wah’ in Persian is an interjection of wonder and admiration. ‘Guru’ in Sanskrit means great, venerable, spiritual preceptor and has been frequently used by Guru Nanak and his successors for Sat-Guru (True Guru) or God. ‘Wah’ is wonder at the Divine might; ‘Gu’ is spiritual darkness while ‘Ru’ is illumination brought to eliminate this darkness. Cumulatively, the name implies wonder at the Divine Light eliminating spiritual darkness. It might also imply -‘Hail the Lord whose Name eliminates spiritual darkness’ Thus the two constituents of Waheguru (Wahe+Guru) implies the state of wondrous ecstasy and offering homage to the Lord.

The attitude of wonder and total submission at the sight of Divine Greatness is prominently visible in Guru Nanak when he wrote Gurbani, for example:-

Wonder and ecstasy are expressed at the cosmic order and its mystery full of Divinely-appointed system. This last saloke concludes with ‘ Ever present to our gage is wonder. At the sight of this mystery are we wonderstruck. Only by supreme good fortune is it unravelled.’ Continuing to the next Saloke to Pauri 4, Guru Ji says:

In Japji, besides other themes, one that stands out prominent is wonder at the cosmic order. In stanza 16 is the expression of wonder at the limitlessness of space. Stanzas 17-19, each beginning with ‘Asankh’ (infinite) are uttered in the same mood of wonder.

Waheguru is the Gurmantar for the Sikhs (invocatory formula received from the Guru) or NAAM for repetition (silently or aloud) and meditation upon the Supreme Reality. Naam (the Name) is sometimes compounded as Satnaam Waheguru to be chanted aloud in the congregation. Naam Japna (repeated utterance of God’s Name Waheguru ) is one of the three cardinal moral principals of Sikhism, the other two being Kirat Karni (honest labour) and Vand Chhakna (sharing one’s victuals with the needy)

Since the manifestation of the Khalsa by Guru Gobind Singh in 1699, Waheguru has been part of the Sikh salutation - Waheguru Ji Ka Khalsa Waheguru Ji Ki Fateh - (Hail the Khalsa who belongs to the Lord God ! Hail the Lord God to whom belongs the victory).

Kartar Surindar Singh

If you go to the Golden Temple you may observe some Tibetan pilgrims who come to pray there, bowing down at each of their steps. These people are Buddhists who may belong to one of the numerous sects of Tibetan Buddhism, who regard Guru Nanak as Guru Rinpoche. There are many teachings in common - the middle path of living, the importance of congregation called sangam/sangat, the importance of meditation, the individual's responsibility for their destiny, even the archetypal images of the warrior monk, in Gurmat the saint-soldier tradition.

Sikhs equally have great reverence for Buddhist teachers. It is a matter of no small pride that a Sikh escorted the Dalai Lama to India when he exiled Tibet. Indeed, Punjab, the Sikh homeland, was formerly called Gandhara, the home of Mahayana Buddhism. This goes back to a period when the Dhamma was revered by almost half the people of the world.

The main difference is that whereas the Buddha-nature is held to be All Pervasive but people must make efforts to realise it, the Guru-nature is also All-Pervasive but reaches out to everyone. It is a matter of effort against Grace. However, in reality the difference is perhaps a matter of emphasis since the Mahayana tradition lays a special stress on compassion finding expression in the figure of the Bodhistavva and the Sikh tradition also speaks of the need to choose; otherwise, there is no gift of life, and Universal Amazing Grace is not a gift, but an imposition. The other difference is the clear monotheism of the Gurus as against the agnosticism or even atheism of some proponents of the Dhamma.

"All the Buddhas created by Thee, proclaim Thee." (Guru Granth Sahib Ji, p.6) It is often said that Buddha was an atheist, but in Truth he was simply silent about the existence of a God or not, since he regarded it as irrelevant to his method. In the Sikh tradition, Buddha is regarded as a sincere worshipper since "God" to a Sikh is not simply One Being, but also Universal Consciousness and Truth.

Kanwar Ranvir Singh

Extract from an interview with Christy Campbell

"Maharajah Duleep Singh had been one of the richest men in England. He had disappeared in 1887, had run off to Paris and had died six years later in poverty and disgrace, with no money left. A great fortune had vanished. He had eight children by two different wives; none of whom themselves had had children. So the line was extinct, there were no heirs to claim this fortune. Various people said: “This is a curse. It’s the curse of the Guru,”; that the line had to die out because of an ancient curse. Which is intriguing.

"I got a commission for a magazine article from the Sunday Telegraph; I went to Amritsar, which is the holy city of the Sikhs, where the Golden Temple is, and met families who claimed they were descendants of the Duleep Singh dynasty which branched out from the Great Maharajah who made the Empire in the 1830s.

"I interviewed heirs and they told their part of the story. One family were very impoverished. They were a children of a truck driver, now 1972. There was a woman in Delhi who was very grand, an aristocrat and wanted nothing to do with claiming fortunes. There was a tremendously powerful cultural legacy for these people. Because of their own story, because their kingdom was annexed by the British in 1849. The boy king who is the principal character was removed from his throne by the British Governor-General at the age of eleven. He was made to sign a treaty handing everything over to Britain, his fortune, his jewels, his treasure house, his kingdom and he gave the Koh-I-Noor diamond, which is the most famous jewel in the world, to the Governor-General who then presented it to Queen Victoria and it remained her personal property until her death.

"I found out that he was brought up as an English gentleman. He was given a pension of fifty thousand pounds a year and a huge estate in East Anglia. He married a Christian girl, an Egyptian girl who he met in Cairo on a journey. So why on earth did his daughter have a Swiss bank account? Could it have been that he put something very precious there in the 1880s or 1890s? Did his daughter, who I subsequently found the MI5 file on her, who lived in Germany in 1914-18 when Britain was at war with Germany. Did she pick up her legacy of her father? Was there some political or cultural mystery about this bank account which would lead me into to the story of the whole family and the structure of the dynasty?

"Meanwhile, I had to find an heir who would open the bank account for me. Was it a vault, was it an account, was it a safety deposit box? Nobody knew. And yet in India it was assumed that it was some magic vault which contained the secrets of the universe like Tutankamun’s tomb or whatever."

Jassa was a normal young man – studying at University – when he met Sharan Kaur. He fell for this woman immediately, wanting to spend the rest of his life with her – and she felt the same. Then, suddenly, in 1984, Amritsar was attacked and things were no longer the same for Sikhs.

This book follows the story of two normal people who were affected by the events of the time, and how they dealt with their world being turned upside down.

his body
fearlessly fighting from the saddle.

May these stanzas take one footstep in Gurdit Singh's shoes
towards linking people oceans apart,
May they lay the foundation stone for tolerance like Mian Mir
as he helped build our nation's heart.

May these thoughts for a moment be as steadfast as

Mani Singh
as his limbs were slowly chopped alive,
May they for a fleeting second maintain the same conviction
displayed by the Beloved Five.

May these metaphors emit an ounce of Baba Buddha's

imagery
as he gave Hargobind two swords,
May they symbolize the kettle and kirpan nourishing

the needy
and overthrowing the overlords.

May these rhymes hold one degree of Bhagat Puran

Singh's warmth
as he sheltered kids in need,
May they give rise to a nation of Ram Mohammed

Singh Azaads,
citizens without caste, colour or creed.

May this poem be a spoonful as sweet as Mata Sahib

Kaur's sugar,
adding humility to the Khalsa's iron will,
May it humbly bow in closing to Zafarnama's fountainhead,
Guru Gobind Singh's divine quill.