religious tradition - citeseerx

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T.N. MADAN

Secularisation and the Sikh

Religious Tradition

L’auteur examine les faits saillants de l’émergence et de l’évo-lution de la tradition religieuse Sikh. Il fixe son attention sur leprocessus de sécularisation. Il tente de montrer comment la répu-diation de l’idéal Hindu de renonciation et I’accent mis sur unemorale d’orientation intra-mondaine ont conduit le Sikhisme àenvisager progressivement le pouvoir politique comme un but légi-time. Foi religieuse et conflit armé se sont alors imbriqués et sontdevenus les moyens de cet objectif. Au cours de ce processus, laconception Sikh du sécularisme a entraîné la suppression de laséparation entre la religion et l’Etat. Mais cette perspective entretoutefois en conflit aujourd’hui avec le processus de modernisa-tion qui cherche au contraire à limiter le rôle de la religion dansla vie publique.

Social Compass, XXXIII/2-3, 1986, 257-273

The word secularisation has been used in the West in a number of interre-lated meanings. These include notably the following: (1) an increasing invol-vement with ‘this, our, world’ and an affirmation of ’this-worldliness’ as avalue; (2) a process of ’ ‘ privatisation’ such that the religious life of the indivi-dual is regarded as being his or her personal concern which, therefore, shouldbe protected from undue interference by the Church or the State; (3) a gradualnarrowing down, if not the elimination, of the role of religious beliefs, practi-ces and institutions in everyday life. These (and other related) notions of secu-larisation have emerged, it seems to me, not in stark denial of the place ofreligion in human life but from a dialectic of the religious and secular domainsthe complementary opposition of which has been recognised from the verybeginning in the Christian tradition. In this paper I attempt an examinationof the significance of the fact that, in the Sikh religious tradition an originalattitude of world affirmation was in course of time redefined to emphasise theunity of the Church and the State, so that what might seem contradictory interms of the Western civilisation is here sought to be reconciled. This develop-ment within the Sikh tradition cannot but be of deep interest to students ofcomparative religion and to theorists of secularisation.

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1. MANI JITAI JAGA JITU.&dquo;To conquer the mind is to win the world.

&dquo;

(GURU NANAK, Japuji 28)

Of the great religious traditions of mankind, the Sikh tradition is theyoungest, being barely five hundred years old. Its emergence and developmenthave been recorded in both oral and literary media. It is a unique religion inas-much as its founder (if he may be called so) was a literate person (unlike theBuddha, Jesus and Mohammed) as were his nine successor-gurus. If this leadsone to expect that the character of this religious tradition and the details ofits development are beyond any controversy, one would be in error. Not onlyhave non-Sikh scholars been in disagreement over many basic issues, but theSikhs themselves also have found agreement on them hard to arrive at’. Theambiguity and mystery associated with the origin and development of a reli-gion should perhaps not surprise us at all for it is mystery that entails faith.Given the ambiguities, then, one must opt for particular versions of contro-versial events to construct an interpretation of the tradition. What follows issuch an interpretative effort to examine the relationship between this cumula-tive religious tradition and the sociological notions of secularisation andsecularism 2. The limitation of space necessitates a concentration on certainbasic issues, though a detailed discussion alone can do justice to the problemposed here.

While for the Sikh believer, this ‘new’ religious tradition begins withdivine revelation, the sociologist must (following Max Weber) seek to supple-ment ’subjective understanding’ (verstehen) with ‘causal adequacy’ as mani-fest in the relations between relevant historical events. In other words, onemust define, if possible, the context for the revelation. Fortunately, it is possi-ble to do so in the case of the Sikh religious tradition: the context for its emer-gence is provided by the interplay of political, economic, social and culturalsituations in the Panjab in the late 15th century.

Ever since the first intrusions of invading Muslim armies in the 11 th cen-tury, the Panjab had been subjected to much political turmoil and violence.The image of the king had come to be that of a ‘butcher’ (to quote the firstSikh Guru, Nanak Dev, himself 3) rather than that of the ‘ protector’ . Nanak(1469-1539), a pious god-loving Hindu of gentle disposition, had felt impel-led, after witnessing the brutality of the Mughal king Babar’s invasions of

1. Among knowledgeable ’outsiders’ we find such sharp disagreements as are illustrated by, for instance,the assertion that the Sikh religious tradition evolved in the direction of creating almost a nation’ (Eliot 1954:272) contrasted with the judgment that the Sikhs ’are virtually a caste of the Hindus’ (Toynbee 1954: 415).The disagreements among the ’insiders’ are equally acute and often on basic issues, such as the meaning ofthe word’ Sikh’ itself. According to Khushwant Singh, the word is’ presumably derived ultimately from theSanskrit shishya, disciple, or shiksha, instruction — Pali, sikkha’ (1963: 36). While this is the generally accep-ted view, other dissenting views mclude the following: ’The word « Sikh » ... derives its origin from Pali andmeans the same as in the great Buddha’s Dhammpad — the elect, or in the Sikh parlance, chosen (by God),God’s own’ (G. Singh 1978: xxxv; also see Kapur Singh 1959: 276).2 The notions of ’faith’ and ’cumulative tradition’ are considered by W. Cantwell Smith as forming the

core of the phenomenon called religion (see Smith 1963).3 ’This age is a knife, kings are butchers; justice hath taken wings and fled’ (MacAuliffe 1909: I,xliv)



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north India (in 1524-25) to cry in anguish: ’It was Death, disguised as theMughal that made war on us. /When there was such slaughter, such groa-ning,/ Didst Thou not feel the pain, 0 Lord’ (H. Singh 1966: 5)? Nanak’sgrievance was not only against the invader but also against the native Hindukings who had abandoned their moral duty of protecting their subjects (whoin Hindu political thought are the king’s ‘children’ rather than subjects ’).While his wail is also a prayer to God to redeem his creatures, implicit in itis a call to man to assume the duty of self-protection - an idea which is inharmony with Nanak’s concept of human dignity.

The people among whom Nanak sought to arouse this sense of responsi-bility were the agricultural, artisan and merchant castes of the Panjab -Nanak himself belonged to the trading caste of Khattris - whom he foundchained by mechanical religious observances and in the grip of degenerateBrahmin priests who themselves were patronised by Hindu kings, such as sur-vived in the hills in the east, and Hindu landlords. Fortunately, the castesystem in the Panjab had already been weakened by the spread of the anti-caste Buddhism in north India in the pre-Muslim period. Subsequently, thesocio-cultural life of the people had come under the influence of both theHindu medieval, egalitarian socioreligious movement of bhakti (‘ devotiona-lism’ according to which all are made equal in their love of god) and the Mus-lim pan-theistic movement of the sufi orders of saints. The Brahmanicaltradition and the social organisation associated with it were also under pres-sure from within as a result of the growth (during the 14th and 15th centuries)of asocial cults of renouncers (sannyasis) and occultists (yogis). These threestreams of religious thought and practice - bhakti, sufism, and hatha- yoga- in synthesis gave rise to the ‘ Sant’ tradition which provided Nanak thematerials out of which he reworked a re- interpretation for those who choseto become his followers 4. One may say that the Panjab was waiting forNanak (Ray 1970: 7-45).

It was in 1499 that Nanak gave his first message after, he said, God thesupreme preceptor (guru), had passed on the holy word (shabad) to him. Themessage was : nal koi hindu na musalman ; there is no Hindu and no Muslim’.That is, no true followers of the Indu and Islamic faiths are to be found any-more. Or, alternatively, being a Hindu, or a Muslim, is meaningless: whatmatters is that one must be a true devotee of God and realise that the practiceof truth is the highest morality: ’Truth above all, /Above truth, truthful con-duct (sachon ore sabh kol upar sach achar’ (K. Singh 1963 : 43). Though theformer interpretation has been generally favoured in the Sikh tradition

(Macauliffe 1909: I, 37), the latter seems equally plausible when read along-side of other related pronouncements, such as the following: ’Neither theveda nor the kateb know the mystery’. While the veda comprise the oldestpre-Brahmanical texts of the Hindus, the word kateb is used by Sikh theolo-gians to refer to the Torah, the Psalms, the Gospel, and the Qur’an (see McLeod 1968: 161). This is not the place, however, to go into the controversialissue of how new the religious perspective (it was not yet a tradition) was andwhether it was more Hindu or Muslim or Buddhist, or an attempted synthesis

4 See footnote 1 above.



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of Hinduism and Islam 5. I will rather concentrate on the essentials of GuruNanak’s teachings 6. Here it is important to note that Nanak’s thought, likeall traditional thought, was marked by comprehensiveness and consistency:its theology entailed its sociology, or, to put it the other way round (whichwould be equally valid), its sociology is incomprehensible without referenceto its theology.

To begin, then, with Nanak’s concept of God, it is clear that his view ofthe world was theocentric. God is the Creator (Kartar) of everything thatexists. It follows that everything is sacred or holy and the dualistic notion ofthe religious versus the secular is inadmissible. Man is, however, an easy preyto temptations and readily lapses into immoralit y7 . His worst error is egoismor hubris (haumai): ‘ Devoted to pride, I weep in sorrow, saith Nanak. Howshall deliverance be obtained’ (MacAuliffe 1909: I, 170)? It is thus that manbecomes separated from his Maker: ’0 my Lord, who can comprehend Thyexcellences! None can recount my sinfulness’ Mc Leod 1968: 177). Man is,however, born to be saved. Nanak taught the notion of ’divine command-ment’ (hukam) which entails the idea of divine initiative for the salvation ofman: ’Nanak, the True King Himself unites (the believer) with Himself’(McLeod 1968: 175). Though divine initiative comes first, man too must strivefor his own salvation: ’The sweat of labour is as beads / Falling by theploughman as seeds sown. / We reap according to our measure / Some forourselves to keep, some to others give’ (K. Singh 1963: 47, n41). What God.intends for man is his hukam : this is knowable to man through shabad (theholy word) with the guidance of the preceptor (guru) and by meditation onGod’s name (nam) : ‘ For a diseased world the remedy is the Name’ (McLeod1968: 195).

The primacy of Nanak’s concern with individual salvation need hardly beemphasised (Ray 1970: 61) ; what must not be overlooked, however, is the factthat he did not teach a selfish concern for one’s own salvation alone but ratherthe moral responsibility of the true believer for the salvation of fellow humanbeings as well. He himself summed up his teaching in breath-taking simplicityand profundity: kirt karo, nam japo, vand chakho : work for your living ;abide in meditative recitation of God’s name; share what you have with others

(K. Singh 1963: 47). The self is thus seen in relation to the divine and thesocial, so that a withdrawal from either of these relationships must spell one’sextinction. It is this combination of piety and practical activity which is theessence of Nanak’s this-worldliness, his secularism.

While following the devotees of the ‘ Sant’ tradition in emphasising thatman’s ultimate goal should be to merge with God, unlike them Nanak affirmedthe worthwhileness of man’s worldly existence and repudiated the Brahmanical

5 For the argument in favour of a strong Muslim influence, see, e g., Khan 1967 McLeod (1968) has,however, argued against it and contentded that a third way, based on the rejection of both Hinduism and Islam,rather than a synthesis of the two, was mtended by Nanak Kapur Singh (1959) has put forward a strong and

interesting argument in favour of Buddhist influences.6 For accounts of Nanak’s teachings I have depended upon his own ’Japuji’ and other writings (in

various English translations) Khushwant Smgh (1963), McLeod (1968), and Ray (1970).7 Nanak warned:’ This God-built house of the body, / Of which the soul is a tenant, has many doors

/ The five temptations that the flesh is heir to / Make daily raids upon it’ (T. Singh et al. 1960: 84).



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ideal of renunciation. ’Having renounced the life of the householder (grihas-tha), why go begging at the householders door?’ he asked. ’Of all renuncia-tions, the best is to give up lust, anger and greed’ (J. Singh 1967: 41). He‘ rejected altogether the practice of celibacy and asceticism, of penances andausterities, of pilgrimages and formal religious exercises, worship of images,and the authority of the so-called sacred texts’ (Ray 1970: 57). By abandoningboth ritualism and occultism he turned his back on magic and miracles andon castes and sects. Instead he extolled the virtues of the company of godlypeople (sadh sangat) which, alongside of the repetition of God’s name, abso-lute truthfulness, contentment, and restraint of the senses, he considered asthe five pathways to union with the divine (see K. Singh 1963: 42f). A conco-mitant of the holy assembly or congregation (sangat) was the institution of thecommunity kitchen (guruka langar, the guru’s kitchen) which dealt a severeblow to Brahmanical notions of purity and pollution and commensal exclusi-vism. Sitting down to eat together in a single row (pangat) was the secularaspect of sangat and became a powerful cementing force among Nanak’s fol-lowers. In short, Nanak held up the ideal of raj men jog (detachment in themidst of worldly involvements) for his followers to pursue. The way to truthlay for him through a righteous this-worldly life. It is in this sense thatNanak’s message had the character of a secular ideology8.

It is debatable if Nanak thought of himself as the founder of a newreligion 9 ; he surely would not have wanted to form a new sect. He did,however, want the disciples who had gathered around him to continue to livedifferently from the others (Hindus, Muslims), and so he named a successor,Lehna (1504-1552), whom he renamed Angad (literally, ’part of my body’)(K. Singh 1963: 49). By this single act, he planted the seed for the growth ofa new religious community and, simultaneously, and unintentionally, laid thefirst bars, as it were, for the construction of an ’iron cage’ for the Sikhs’o.According to the Sikh religious tradition, Angad and the subsequent eightGurus, though nine different human beings, are but one person and that per-son is Nanak. Therefore, whatever their teachings and actions, these have tobe acknowledged to be the teachings and actions of Nanak. The Sikhs havetried thus to overcome the problem of reconciling the teachings and actionsof the different Gurus. It is suggested here, however, that, in the context ofthe problem set for the present discussion (namely secularism and secularisa-tion), these differences are of critical importance; in fact they could not butbe so given the changes that took place, over the 150 years or so followingNanak’s death, in the internal composition of the Sikh community and itspolitical environment.

8 Cf. ’Over the life of the recluse the Guru has exalted the station of the Grihasti (householder)... TheGrihasti is the person fixed amidst moral duty, which he must face and assume even at the cost of suffering.The Guru’s meaning is unmistakably clear: our life is circumscribed by material surroundings, yet man musttranscend these to affirm spiritual and moral fulfilment’ (Talib 1969. 95).9 To call ’the gentle and intense Indian mystic’, Nanak, the « founder of Sikhism », as is often done, is

surely to misconstrue both him and history. He was a devotee (bhakta) who .. attacked religious formalismof all kinds. Several generations later his followers were religiously formalised, systematised.... Out of thiswas born what we call «followerism»’ (Smith 1963. 66f). Toynbee (1960: 9) refers to Nanak as the ’founder’of Sikhism but adds that Nanak himself would perhaps not have agreed.

10 The concept of the ’iron cage’ is borrowed from Max Weber (1930 181).



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As stated above, Nanak belonged to a Khatri caste. The Khatris were acongeries of castes (’jatis’, to be precise) comprising the traditional Vaniya(or Baniya) trading and commercial castes, agriculturists and artisans. Allthese communities, unlike the Brahmans and the Kshattriyas (the two highestranked castes of priests and warriers respectively), had well-developed ethicsof work and a market orientation. Expectedly they often did well by themsel-ves in economic terms (judging by the standards of the medieval period) butthey lacked the status of high castes; in fact many of the craftsmen were consi-dered unclean by the two top castes (Ray 1967: 14). It is they who became thefirst disciples of Nanak and in large numbers. These was no love lost betweenhim and the Brahmans and the Kshattriyas.

The relationship between the Guru and his followers was of mutualadvantage. His egalitarian social outlook and ritual-free religious faith offe-red them release from their relatively low status and the control of the Brah-mans. His message made their work respectable as well as profitable. On theirpart, they not only provided a following for the new Guru, but also the mate-rial means to operate the quite revolutionary institution of the community kit-chen, which provided free food to those followers who needed or wanted totake advantage of the facility. According to a Sikh historian, the Khatri tra-ders found in the teachings of the early Gurus exactly what they sought andconsequently lent their powerful support to the Sikh movement imparting toit the character of an urban or town-based movement.... Gradually the agri-cultural classes also came in. Their joining the movement was facilitatedpartly by the hold the commercial classes had on the cultivating classes’ (F.Singh 1969: 3). It was thus that the Sikh innovation became a broad-basedsocial movement of immense potential. Reversing the well-known Weberianargument about the relationship between the Puritan ethic and the spirit ofcapitalism (Weber 1930), I would suggest that, in the Panjab, the market-cum-profit oriented Khatris ensured the success of the religious faith pro-pounded by Nanak. Their secularism converged with Nanak’s.

Nanak’s choice of Angad, instead of his saintly son Sri Chand or hisyounger brother, is attributed by the historians of the Sikhs to the former’sappropriate spiritual qualities, but some of them also record the fact thatLehna had a sizable personal following and this may have weighed with theGuru (K. Singh 1963: 49). And the Sikh community did prosper in numbersand resources under Angad with the result that the institution of the commu-nity kitchen (langar) became stabilised. He established the practice of collec-ting the offerings made by the Sikhs and there is reason to believe that he mayhave encouraged the keeping of accounts in the manner of Khatriaccountants &dquo;. He also placed a great emphasis upon physical fitness amonghis followers who were encouraged to engage in drill, wrestling and competi-tive games. He thus planted the seeds of what was to flower into one of themost deeply ingrained self- and other-ascribed images of the Sikhs as peopleof exceptional valour, or a ’martial race’ as the British liked to call them. By

11 Guru Angad evolved the Gurumukhi script using for this purpose basically the script employed byKhattri traders to maintain accounts (see G. Smgh 1978: xl). It is obvious that he must have been familiar withaccount-keeping.



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all accounts Angad was not only a worthy spiritual Guru but also a worldlyman and an able organiser of men and institutions.

The size of the following and the resources they commanded had grownso large by the time of Amar Das (1479-1574), the third Guru, that specialmeasures for their organisation and use had to be taken, and he proved equalto the task. He divided his wide-spread followers into 22 parish-like groupscalled manji, and placed each manji under an agent, called masand, who col-lected the offerings from the followers and also provided them spiritual gui-dance. The equal emphasis upon the secular and religious functions of theseagents is noteworthy. If a tilting of the balance did occur, it would seem tohave been in favour of the secular function.

In this connection, a most noteworthy incident has been preserved in theSikh tradition. Pointing out that Amar Das emphasized the need and sanctityof secular activity among the Sikhs’, Gopal Singh writes: ’When Gango, aKhatri, came to see him and asked, &dquo;What shall I do to save myself?&dquo;, theGuru replied, &dquo;Go and open a bank at Delhi and dwell upon the name ofGod &dquo; (1978:1, xli). This reminds one of the kind of advice which Puritan pio-neers such as Benjamin Franklin gave to the newly settled pilgrims’ in NorthAmerica (Weber 1930: 50off). It has also been recorded that Amar Das stressedsocial egalitarianism by insisting that his visitors first eat in the communitykitchen before meeting with him 12 , and this rule was applied even to theMughal emperor Akbar when he visited the Guru. Moreover, though the fareserved in his kitchen was rich, he himself ate frugally and only what he himselfearned by his own labour (H. Singh 1964: 24).

Though asceticism was rejected, austerity was acknowledged as a perso-nal virtue in the lives of these early Gurus. At the same time the exhortationto their followers was to strive for worldly fortunes. The fourth Guru, RamDas (1534-1581), a builder of cities and towns, including Amritsar, which isthe holy city most revered by the Sikhs, invited traders from wherever his mes-sage could reach to settle down there. ’The Guru asked his Sikhs to help eachother in founding business houses and pray for their success. The Sikhs fromnow on remained no longer small farmers or petty shopkeepers, but went asfar as Kabul to buy and sell horses, and become jewellers, embroidery wor-kers, carpenters and masons, bankers and wholesalers’(G. Singh 1978: I,xli).

With the passing away of Ram Das the first phase of the evolution of theSikh community came to an end. During this phase the two most significantfactors in this evolutionary process were, first, the very unusual personal qua-lities of the Gurus, who combined their spiritual quest with an affirmation ofthe worthwhileness of mundanity in a seamless worldview and second, thesocial composition of the early followers. These factors were able to operatein unison in relatively well settled political conditions, particularly during thelong and highly tolerant reign of the great Mughal king Akbar.

Ram Das broke with tradition when he chose his son-in-law as the nextGuru; the succession thereafter went from father to son while the first three

12 pehle pangat piche sangat : first sit down m a row to eat with others ; only then may you sit with theGuru.



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Gurus had strictly avoided this choice. Moreover, after Akbar’s death thepolitical environment within which the Sikhs had to operate became increa-singly hostile, compelling them to abandon their early pacifist ways. Finally,the social composition of the community underwent a radical transformationwith the massive infusion of the Jats. In choosing to cope with adverse cir-cumstances from a position of strength and engaging in politics the SikhGurus, from now on, contributed to the making of what I called, earlier inthis paper, the Sikh ‘ iron cage’ and what the Sikhs themselves generally con-ceive of as their call to destiny. More about this further below.

Ram Das’s son, Arjun Mal (1563-1606), was a great consolidator. Nanakhad given the new message for whosoever would listen and bound them in theact and symbolism of the common meal. Angad gave the Sikhs a distinctivescript. Amar Das gave them a place of pilgrimage at Goindwal, where he cons-tructed a sacred well (baoll); though this was against the letter and the spiritof the teachings of Nanak, it fulfilled the traditional aspirations of the people.Ram Das became the instrument of a miracle, for the tank which he dug outat his new city of Chak Ram Das is believed by pious Sikhs to have been filledmiraculously by the will of God. Its waters are thus no less than amrita, theholy water that bestows immortality: hence the renaming of the city as Amrit-sar, the pool of amrita.

Arjun Mal’s contributions on the positive side were a fitting capstone onthis edifice. He constructed a temple in the holy tank - known as ’Harman-dir Sahib’, ‘the honoured temple of God - and he gave the Sikhs their HolyBook by commiting to writing the prayers, hymns and sayings of the firstthree Gurus and his own as also those of many Hindu saints and Muslim sufisof the Sant tradition. He converted the traditional voluntary offering to theGuru into an obligatory tithe (dasvandh). An indefatiguable traveller, he wonfor the Sikh faith the following of thousands of Jats. On the negative side,he obviously felt overwhelmed by his achievements and accepted the honou-red sobriquet of Sacha Padshah, ‘ the true emperor’. He also got involved inpolitics and took the side of the rebel prince Khusrau against his father, theemperor Jehangir. This cost him his life, but in the process he gave the Sikhstheir first martyr, establishing yet another significant element of the Sikh tra-dition - the call to martyrdom - which continues to be a powerful motiveforce in the lives of many Sikhs till today.

I must pause here to explain the significance of the infusion of the Jatswhich has been mentioned above. Though originally pastoralists in Rajas-than, the Jats had moved into the Panjab from the ninth century onwards andestablished themselves as very hard-working and successful peasant cultiva-tors. Though they had advanced economically, they suffered from a stigmati-sed identity in relation to caste Hindus. ’With their strong rural base, theirmartial traditions, their normally impressive physique, and their considerableenergy, the Jats have for many centuries constituted the elite of the Panjabvillages. They are also noted for their straightforward manner, for a tremen-dous generosity, for an insistence upon their right to take revenge, and fortheir sturdy attachment to the land’(McLeod 1976: 11). The Khatris were themoney-lenders and mentors of the Jats and the first three Sikh Gurus hailedfrom the Jat country in central Panjab. It was this human component (66 percent of all Sikhs at the 1881 census) of the burgeoning Sikh heritage which



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Arjun Mal, who attained martyrdom in 1606, bequeathed to his son with themessage ‘ to sit fully armed on his throne and to maintain an army to the bestof his ability’ (Field 1914: 19). And Har Gobind did exactly as he was told.This, then, is the first major turning point in the redefinition of secularismin the Sikh religious tradition and must be examined in some detail.

2. CHU KAR AZ HAMA HILATE DAR GUZASHT HALAL ASTBURDAN BA SHAMSHIR DASTWhen all avenues have been explored, all means tried, it is rightful to drawthe sword out of the scabbard and wield it with your hand (GURUGOBIND, Zafarnama)

Harbobind (1595-1644), though only eleven years old when he becamethe sixth Guru of the Sikhs, spoke in the accents of a mature man: ’My seli(rosary worn as a necklace by the previous Gurus symbolising their spiritualpursuits) shall be a swordbelt, and my turban shall be adorned with a royalaigrette’ (MacAuliffe 1909: IV,2). At his investiture he carried two swords inhis swordbelt and explained the significance of his action : ‘ one to avenge myfather, the other to destroy the miracles of Muhammad’ (Narang 1960: 60).In other words, while the one symbolised his temporal power (min), the otherstood for his spiritual authority (pin) 13.

Even more portentous was his decision to have a new temple erectedfacing the Harmandir Sahib (but outside the holy tank of Amritsar) which hecalled the Akal Takht, ’the throne of the Immortal God ’. Therein he had hisown throne built higher than the throne of the Mughal emperor in Delhi, and‘instead of chanting hymns of peace, the congregation heard ballads extollingfeats of heroism, and, instead of listening to religious discourses, discussedplans of military conquests’ (K. Singh 1963: 63). He asked his agents (themasand) to fetch him tribute in men, horses and arms, raised an army, andbuilt a small fortress, Lohgarh (the steel castle), in Amritsar. He had an ambi-valent relationship with the emperor Jehangir (who had had Hargobind’sfather tortured to death), suffered imprisonment, and finally during the timeof the next emperor, Shahjehan, came into open conflit with the imperialtroops on three occasions. The Sikhs acquitted themselves well in these clashesthough they also suttered heavy losses (see H. Singh 1964: 33). By 1634 Har-gobind obviously realised the futility of continued conflict with imperialpower and withdrew into a quieter way of life in the Himalayan foothills ofeast Panjab where he stayed till his death ten years later. Apart from the con-flict with the Mughal kings, he also had to grapple with the organisationalproblems generated by an increasing and an increasingly heterogeneous follo-wing, including the Jats and ‘ superstition-ridden Hindus’ (K. Singh 1963:66), and even criminal and fugitives’ (Cunningham 1955:55).

13 It is not clear how exactly Hargobind defined the relationship between spiritual authority and temporalpower His religious tradition had paid little attention to the latter; in fact, Nanak had ridiculed and reviledkings, saying even worms were better for kings forget God. In this connection the significance of building AkalTakht separately, outside the holy tank, may not be minimised In the comparative context Dumont (1983:15) has observed that the ’logical’ relation between the two functions is one of ’hierarchical complementarity’with auctoritas encompassing potestas.



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What is the significance of ‘the call to arms’ given by Hargobind in thegeneral context of the evolution of the Sikh community and in terms of theprocesses of secularisation? The established opinion of Sikh scholars themsel-ves flows from their the-oak-tree-in-the-acorn position : ‘ We do not see anyessential difference in the outlook of Guru Hargobind from his predecessors’except perhaps in emphasis which was of course the need of the time’ (G.Singh 1978: xlii). Some non-Sikh historians echo this judgement when theymaintain that Hargobind, and later Gobind Singh (the tenth Guru), did notdeviate ‘ from the great ideal of Guru Nanak’ by transforming ‘ a purelypietistic faith and society to a militant and crusading one directed towardstemporal ends’: they are said to have only elaborated in the context of asomewhat (sic) different socio-political situation, what Guru Nanak stood forin his own time and space’ (Ray 1970: 86). Two interrelated issues of interpre-tation are involved here: one theological and the other sociological. Sikhhermeneutics has had to reckon with Nanak’s admonition, ‘ fight with no wea-pons except shabad (the holy word)’ (Cunningham 1955 : 40), and an explicitformulation on this issue had to await Gobind Singh. More about this below.

From the sociological point of view the contextualist approach of scho-lars such as Gopal Singh and Niharranjan Ray grievously minimises the signi-ficance of both the changing composition of the Sikh community (its internalorder) and its relations with the Mughal empire (its external order) and, there-fore, provides us with emasculated history. From the specific point of viewof the present paper, a critical change in the concept of secularism and in theprocess of secularisation must be emphasised. Nanak’s moral this-worldliness, summed up as ’work, worship, and charity’, and above all faithin divine grace, are now redefined in terms of temporal power and of honourand revenge. To use a sociologist’s phrase, hope has become political (Martin1978: 63), and when this happens, the encompassing character of spiritualauthority as opposed to temporal power, even if acknowledged, is in factundermined. Writing from the perspective of the historian of religions Toyn-bee has observed : ‘ While it is manifest in the case of Judaism, Christianityand the Mahayana that a higher religion was being diverted from its missionby being exploited politically, this is not less true, though it may be lessobvious, in the case of Islam and Sikhism’ (1979: 110).

A religious concern - the individual seeker’s union with the divinity -was the ultimate end in Nanak’s secularism. After Hargobind its nature cameto be radically redefined: in Dumont’s words (used in another though relatedcontext), religion now became a ’sign’ of distinction between social groupsand, therefore, a ‘shadow’ of itself (Dumont 1970: 91). A process of seculari-sation different from the earlier one was initiated. Its most important charac-teristic was an emphasis upon the unity of religion and politics, but in amanner that the primacy of the former was weakened. It could also be cons-trued as a process of ‘sacralisation’, indicative of the elevation of the secularworld to a position it had not occupied before: pursuit of power (in the socio-logical sense of the word) could now pretend to be on par with the religiousquest - a thing of value - and even overshadow it. This new world-viewfound its full expression in the words and actions of the tenth and last Guru,Gobind Singh, but not before another and truly remarkable martyrdom tookits place in the Sikh religious tradition.



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Hargobind’s three immediate successors (his grandson, great grandson,and son, in that order) are of no particular interest in terms of this discussion,beyond the fact that, though they could not completely withdraw from politi-cal involvements, they stressed the saintly element of the Sikh religious tradi-tion more than its recently acquired martial fervour. Finally, in 1675, TeghBahadur, the ninth Guru, suffered martyrdom defending the inalienablehuman right of freedom of conscience. The efforts of the intolerant and fun-damentalist emperor Aurangzeb to bring Tegh Bahadur, who was widely res-pected not only by those who called themselves Sikhs but also by Hindusgenerally, under the heel were successfully resisted by the saintly Guru till hewas executed in Delhi. As his son, Gobind Rai, wrote later: ’To protect their(the Hindus’) right to wear their caste marks and sacred threads, / Did he,in the dark age, perform the supreme sacrifice. / To help the saintly he wentto the utmost limit, / He gave his head but never cried in pain. / He sufferedmartyrdom for the sake of his faith’ (K. Singh 1963: 74f).

Govind Rai (1666-1708) was only nine year’s old when he was called uponto cremate his father’s severed head in Anandpur (east Panjab). Ever since theretreat of Hargobind into the Shivalik Hills area, the Sikh Gurus had imbidedthe local cultural and religious ethos. A most significant element of this ethoswas the Hindu cult of Shakti, that is the divinity conceived of as ’power’ andrepresented as the goddess. The Hindu concept of power is, of course, totaland not to be equated with the notion of ‘power’ in the Western civilisation.’The Shakti blended easily with the Jat cultural patterns which had beenbrought from the plains. The result was a new and powerful synthesis whichprepared the Panth (the Sikh community) for a determinative role in the chao-tic circumstances of the eighteenth century’ (McLeod 1976: 14).

Godin Rai’s upbringing in Patna (in eastern India) and Anandpur tookplace in a Hindu environment and he attained a considerable knowledge ofthe Hindu as well as the Sikh religious traditions. He defined his own rolealmost literally in terms of the Hindu scripture. Echoing the Bhagavadgita,he wrote: ‘For this purpose was I born, / To uphold righteousness, to protectthose worthy and virtuous. / To overcome and destroy the evil doers’ (H.Singh 1966: 176)’4. He, however, repudiated the Hindu idea of avatar:‘ Whoever calls me the supreme Being shall suffer in hell. / Recognise me asGod’s servant only’ (ibid. 13).

Gobind was obviously deeply impressed by the Hindu cult of the goddessof destruction and wrote long poems in praise of her: his first compositionand the only major Punjabi work was war Sri Bhagautiji ki’ which is basedon the Markandya Purana (a Brahmanical text). Subsequently, he wrote apoem in Hindi also, ’Chandi Charitra’, honouring the goddess. His designa-tion of the sword as ’Bhagauti’, the goddess, has these Hindu roots, for thesword is her symbol in Hindu mythology. He also called god Sarbloh, ‘ all steel’(pure steel). The supplicatory prayer, ardas which he composed begins thus:’Having first remembered the Sword, meditate on Guru Nanak’. Another

14 Cf the Bhagavadgita (IV.7-8): whenever righteousness wanes and evil prevails, I go forth from age to

age to protect the good, punish the wicked, and reestablish the sovereignty of good



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well-known prayer composed by him concludes with these words: ‘Hail! hailto the Creator of the World, / The Saviour of Creation, my Cherisher, / Hailto thee, 0 Sword’ (H. Singh 1666: 47)!

Gobind Rai’s inspiration was more his grandfather, Hargobind, than hisfather, and he waged war against the Mughals. He introduced the notion ofdharmayuddha, that is ‘ holy war’ or ‘ war to uphold righteousness’, into theSikh religious tradition, drawing upon, once again, Hindu sources. At the endof his rendering of the story of the avatar Krishna, he wrote : ’ I have cast intothe popular tongue the story of Bhagvata. / This I have done with no otherpurpose, Lord, except to glorify the holy war’ (H. Singh 1966: 48). His justi-fication of the theology of the sword (obviously mindful of Nanak’s exhorta-tion to his followers to wield no weapon and rely solely on the recitation ofGod’s name) was also conveyed, so it is said, in a message called the ‘ epistleof victory’ (Zafarnama), which he sent to Aurangzeb : ‘ When all avenueshave been explored, all means tried, it is rightful to draw the sword out of thescabbard and wield it with your hand’ (K. Singh 1963: 78, n5). As KhushwantSingh notes, ’It would be idle to pretend that this change of emphasis waspurely theological’ (1963: 89).

Ultimately, when in 1699, Gobind Rai instituted baptism for the Sikhs,one of the five symbols of initiation he recommended was the sword (kirpan),or an emblem of it, which a Sikh was exhorted to always carry on his

person 15. All this emphasis on the sword pointed to a political goal as partof the religious quest, summed up in the words ‘ the Khalsa (the communityof baptised Sikhs) shall rule...’, which are spoken at the end of the supplica-tory prayer (ardas) and which are traditionally attributed to Gobind Singh.(He took the last name ‘Singh’, characteristic of Hindu warrior castes, afterhe had had himself baptised (K. Singh 1963: 90).) Nanak’s ultimate concern,namely the seeker’s union with the divinity, was thus significantly amended,thereby promoting the altered process of secularisation initiatied by Hargo-bind. The eyes were now set upon the establishment of a Sikh state. A signifi-cant instrument of the quest for power was to be bands of warriors Uatha)modeled on the congregation (sangat), bound by codes of conduct (rahat-nama) which emphasised collective purpose and identity rather than indivi-dual autonomy. The rise of individualism which characterised thesecularisation of Europe from the 17th century onwards is here conspicuousby its absence.

15 The emphasis originally was on the symbolic rather than a real sword; Gobmd himself used to weara miniature sword in his hair. The other related symbols are as is well-known, unshorn hair tied into a knotwith a comb placed in it, a steel bracelet worn on the right forearm, and knee-length trousers. Gobind laid downthe wearing of unshorn hair as an obligation; the other items are not mentioned in the code of conduct (rahit-nama) he had drawn up for the Sikhs For two different and unusual interpretations of the five symbols seeKapur Smgh (1959 137-54) and Uberoi (1969 123-38).



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3. God wanted me to look upon all religions with one eye; that is why he tookaway the light from the other(MAHARAJA RANJIT SINGH in conversation with a Muslim fakir)

The effort to establish a Sikh state succeeded almost immediately afterthe death (by murder) of Gobind Singh in 1708. Since he had declared the clo-sure of the institution of the human Guru, and designated the Holy Book(Granth Sahib) and the community of the baptised Sikhs (Khalsa) respectivelyas the spiritual and temporal Gurus, his chosen successor to carry on the holywar’ - a Hindu renouncer - felt free to define his own identity and cast him-self in the kingly role, though he said that he was no more than a slave (banda)of Gobind Singh. Banda Bahadur, ’Brave Slave’ (for that was the name hechose for himself), moved swiftly, incited an agrarian uprising, fought Mus-lim armies, and captured the province of Sirhind from the Mughal governorin 1710, less than two years after Gobind Singh’s death. Banda now assumedthe title of padshah, the emperor, and even issued coins to mark the inaugura-tion of his rule. All this was very short-lived, however, and Banda was execu-ted in 1716.

Eighty years and more had to pass before a genuine state was establishedby a Sikh in 1799 when the eighteen-year-old Ranjit Singh (incidentally a Jat)captured the city of Lahore from three squabbling Sikh Sardars who were incontrol of it (K. Singh 1963: 196ff). A valiant soldier, a shrewd administratorand a sagacious ruler, Ranjit Singh unified Panjab and adjoining areas underhis direct rule or under other rulers who acknowledged his over-all sovereigntyand paid tribute to him. But - and ironically - Ranjit Singh’s state was nota Sikh state but a monarchy and the prophecy that the Khalsa would rule hadnot been fulfilled. In fact, it has been asserted that the ‘republicanism’ ofGobind Singh was ‘ compromised’ ’gradually progressively and purposely’(Kapur Singh 1959: 352) by Ranjit Singh, who assumed the title of Maharajaat a Brahmanical coronation ceremony in 1801. ’Within a few years after hiscoronation, he reduced into disuetude the supreme authority of the Sikhpolity, the Gurumata (the collective will of the community treated as the opi-nion of the Guru), and entrusted the control of the government of his expan-ding territories to a cabinet of his own choice, in accordance with the ancientHindu monarchical tradition’, though personally he never claimed indepen-dence from the Gurumata’ (ibid.: 360).

We have here a concept of secularism which was new in the evolution ofthe Sikh religious tradition: a gulf is created between the polity and the perso-nal religious faith of the ruler. Ranjit Singh’s first act on entering Lahore hadbeen to ’pay homage’ at two of the city’s mosques associated with its Muslimrulers (K. Singh 1963: 197). He persevered in this policy of showing respectto all communities by personally celebrating their religious festivals. Thoughsuch pluralism could not be said to be alien to the Sikh religious tradition’6,

16 Gobind wrote in his ’Akal Utsat’ ’Recognise all mankind, whether Hindus or Muslims, as one / The

same Lord is the Creator and Nourisher of all, / Recognise no distinctions among them / The monastery andthe mosque are the same, / So are the Hindu worship and the Muslim prayer / Men are all one’ (H. Smgh1966: 3)



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it was Ranjit Singh who made it the basis of state policy. He also promotedthe principle of the equality of all citizens before the law (ibid.: 203). ’Thefactor which contributed most to Ranjit Singh’s success’, writes KhushwantSingh, ’was his respect for all faiths.’ The same historian points out that‘Ranjit Singh’s court reflected the secular pattern of his state’, and that therewere no forced conversions’ in his time. ’This attitude won the loyalty of allhis subjects’ (1963: 294f). But, as already pointed out above, other Sikh histo-rians contest this judgment on one crucial point: according to them RanjitSingh’s secularism was against the Sikh religious tradition (Kapur Singh 1959:284-387). In the idiom of contemporary Indian politics, Ranjit Singh was aprecursor of the secularism of Jawaharlal Nehru and the Constitution of theRepublic of India. This Nehruvian secularism is, however, an anathema tothose who claim to speak in the name of the Sikh religious tradition.

4. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A CLEAN-SHAVEN SIKH

(KHUSHWANT SINGH, A History of the Sikhs, vol. 2(1966), p. 303.)

Ranjit Singh died in 1839 and the kingdom he had built collapsed in 1846,creating a new situation in which the Sikhs, shorn of political power, soughtrefuge in their religious faith, but found it much diluted. The ‘iron cage’ ofworldly involvements had confined the faith too narrowly. Like the Muslimswho, in a similar situation of loss of political power, had earlier turned to the’ purification’ of their religious life (Ahmad 1964), the Sikhs too sought solacein reviving the orthopraxis entailed by their orthodoxy. This involved, amongother things, the reassertion of the supreme position of the Guru, the elimina-tion of those elements of Hindu ritualism which had reasserted their sway inthe everyday life of the Sikhs and, to achieve this, it also involved freeing theSikh temples (gurudwara) from the control of priests who were not baptisedSikhs. The socio-political concomitant of these moves was the redefinition ofSikh identity in the negative slogan. ’We are not Hindus’, necessitated notonly by the inner urge for reform but also the external pressure exercised bythe revivalist Hindu Arya Samaj (K. Singh 1966: 147). Once again religionbecame a ’sign’ of distinction (a la Dumont), this time between the Sikhs andthe Hindus.

Through the Gurudwaras Act of 1925, which the Sikhs were able to getthe British to enact, after a tough struggle, the control of the temples passedinto the hands of a democratically elected body, the Sri Gurudwara Praban-dhak Committee (SGPC), and the political movement against British imperia-lism and Hindu cultural hegemony was taken charge of by the exclusively Sikhpolitical party, Akali Dal (K. Singh 1966: 193-216). Though the Sikhs werenearly unanimous in relation to their religious goals, they found themselvesdivided politically, with most Sikhs (including the Jats) giving support to theAkali Party but others (notably the outcaste Hindu groups who had enteredthe Sikh fold in the late 19th century) supporting the Indian National Congressand its ‘secular’ national politics. Some others even opted for Marxism, thebasic incompatibility between their religious and political faiths notwithstan-ding. Events that could be seen as a reassertion of Sikh republicanism also car-ried in them the seeds of disruptive politics. The partition of the subcontinent



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in 1947 was a tragic and deadly blow to the Sikh community which founditself driven out of areas that had been its home since the very beginning. Thesense of political grievance deepened with the passage of time and the Akalisrepudiated any notion of the separation of the Church and the State whichpolitical analysts read into the secularism of the Constitution of India. Thisrepudiation became the basis for the demand for a Sikh homeland (Nayar1966 and H. Singh 1983: 343ff).

Simultaneously with these political developments, the Sikhs became theprincipal beneficiaries of the very successful Green Revolution in the Panjaband expanding opportunities in industrial enterprise and the urban profes-sions. As world-wide opportunities for secular success beckoned, the Sikhsresponded enthusiastically, but at a price, namely the increasing ‘ incidence ofapostasy’ : ‘the sense of belonging to the Sikh community requires both thebelief in the teachings of the Adi Granth (the Sikh Holy Book) and the obser-vance of the Khalsa tradition initiated by Guru Gobind Singh’ (K. Singh1966: 303). In the circumstances it seems that the Sikh faith will survive onlyif it is enforced by the state, and this could only be done by a Sikh state (ibid. :305).

The most serious threat to the faith is modernisation, which includessecularisation in the sense of a restricted role for religion in the life of the indi-vidual, but the Sikhs with their this-worldly tradition are unlikely to turn theirback on the modern world. A neat bi-polar tradition-versus-modernity modeldoes not wholly capture social reality anywhere, but it is perhaps more appli-cable to some societies, such as the Sikh society, than to others. If this beindeed so, then it is only to be expected that ‘fundamentalism’, which, itseems to me, is always and everywhere the expression of a guilty conscience,will characterise Sikh public life for quite some time to come. In the eyes ofthe orthodox, the three values of ’work, worship, and charity’ have been dis-placed by ‘parasitism, godlessness, and selfishness’ in the lives of many appa-rently successful and modern Sikhs. Hence the call, ’Be good Sikhs’, givenby the fundamentalists. This, then, is what the Sikh ‘iron cage’ has come tobe today.

5. CONCLUSION

This paper has been concerned with an examination of the Sikh religioustradition with a view to finding out what it teaches us about the patterns andprocesses of secularisation. This is a particularly worthwhile exercise in viewof the assertion of many Sikh scholars that, while their religious faith postula-tes the unity of the Gurudwara (Church) and the State, it is at the same timea ‘ secular religion’. In fact it has been argued that this comingling of motifs(spiritual authority and royal power) makes for a certain secularisation offaith in Sikhism’ (A. Singh 1973: 22), so that confidence is expressed that theSikh faith has an inbuilt mechanism that can absorb successfully the essentialspirit of secularism’ (Samundari 1973: 6).

The foregoing discussion has, I trust, brought out the fact that there areat least four patterns of secularisation discernible in the Sikh religious tradi-tion. These are: mundanity; the unity of religion and politics and therefore



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of the Gurudwara and the State; religious pluralism and the separation of reli-gion and politics; and a narrowing of the religious sphere in society. Of these,the first does not by itself entail the second: in fact, and as noted by a numberof Sikh scholars, this merger of functions ‘ ultimately weakened the originalreligious impulse’ (see A. Singh 1973: 22). As for the third and the fourth pat-terns of secularisation, it is obvious that they are at variance and even in con-flict with the first two and have been, therefore, rejected by orthodox Sikhs.

Now, in the context of the Christian tradition Martin (1978) has derivedvariant patterns of secularisation from certain antecedent crucial events. Thepresent examination of the Sikh religious tradition also reveals a similar rela-tionship between the crucial event’ and resultant patterns’. In the contextof interreligious comparison, which has of course not been attempted here,it may be simply stated that a hiatus exists which, confident theories of moder-nisation notwithstanding, poses problems of ’translation’ even after the’transfer’ of certain institutions (most notably the ‘ modern’ state) from onecivilisational setting to another has formally been achieved. India’s religioustraditions - Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Sikhism - do not provide the kindof idiom which the Christian tradition, before and after Luther, did for secu-larisation in its European manifestations. And yet it is these that are beingrecommended as universally valid by courtesy of modernisation theorists.

This paper could have also been indirectly concerned with what Sikhismtells us about religious traditions generally. This is a very large and importantsubject and has not been therefore broached here. A broad observation maybe, however, made briefly. One of the most influential culture theorists oftoday, Clifford Geertz, has argued the case for the study of religions in termsof their content of meaning and symbol, ’conceptions of a general order ofexistence’, and the ‘ long-lasting moods and motivations’ that they generatein human beings (Geertz 1966). It would of course be possible and instructiveto present such a ’cultural account’ of the religion of the Sikhs, and yet theexercise might miss the importance of certain elements of critical importancethat have contributed to its making. As has been argued in this paper, thestructure of Hindu society in the Panjab, the economic pursuits of certaingroups, and the changing character of the political environment within whichit evolved played as crucial a part in the growth of the Sikh religious traditionas did certain theological concepts and cultural symbols, both of varied deri-vation. What is true of Sikhism is likely to be true of other religions also. Theplea is not for a narrowly materialist interpretation of religion but for the esta-blishment of meaningful and adequate relations between the various consti-tuent elements - ideological and material - of a religious tradition.



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