SIKH DHARAM
Gurbani
Ever-Living Wisdom
When you think of scriptural teachings, you might imagine words that are mostly theoretical or lay down rules, or which are purely devotional and other-worldly.
The Sikh Gurus did of course help people to re-examine their lives, to live in a principled way, to cultivate devotion to the Creator and creation, whilst considering the journey of the soul beyond this life. Yet their teachings often took the form of a dialogue, as if they were talking ‘with’ others, rather than ‘at’ them.
Through their verses, they also reasoned with the mind, inspiring it through poetic imagery and lyrical melodies, to bring about inner awakenings as well as outward change.
Learn about Gurbani
Sacred terminology recurring within Guru Granth Sahib Ji
Ik Oankar
Guru Granth Sahib Ji describes Ik Oankar, the Creator, as our soul’s One source and destination. Out of the diverse names that appear for God, the simplest, most repeated name is Har or Hari. This inspires remembrance of God’s all-pervading, life-giving power, helping us to shed the hold of the ego on our mind. The number of times ‘Har’ or ‘Hari’ is mentioned is approximately:
Nām
Then comes ‘Nām’, the infinite, unstruck sound vibration that is God’s sublime power and energy. Sometimes, ‘nām’ can also mean a ‘name of God’ or sacred teaching, blessed to a disciple for meditation. The number of times nām is mentioned in Guru Granth Sahib Ji, in all its variations, is approximately:
Guru
On the learning journey to connect with Ik Oankar, we require ‘gurprasad’, the blessing of the Guru’s loving wisdom to guide us. The number of times ‘Guru’ is mentioned, in all its variations, in Guru Granth Sahib Ji is approximately:
Amrit
The Guru’s blessings are received through ‘amrit’, the sweet nectar of knowing God’s immortal presence, that is evoked throughout Sikh verse. Amrit is also the sanctified water used in the amrit sanchar initiation, where Sikh disciples are blessed with ‘nām’ (as the Mool Mantar and Gurmantar) to meditate on daily. The number of times amrit in all its variations, is mentioned in Guru Granth Sahib Ji is approximately:
Dharam
On the journey to harmonise and connect with Ik Oankar, ‘dharam’ is a way of life based on striving to serve the Creator and creation through wisdom, virtue, right conduct and loving responsibility. For Sikhs it is based on practicing the Guru’s teachings, engaging in nām simran, sewa and kirtan, and walking on the path of amrit. The number of times dharam in all its variations, is mentioned in Guru Granth Sahib Ji is approximately:
From sacred words to a sacred script:
ਧੰਨੁ ਸੁ ਕਾਗਦੁ ਕਲਮ ਧੰਨੁ ਧਨੁ ਭਾਂਡਾ ਧਨੁ ਮਸੁ ॥ ਧਨੁ ਲੇਖਾਰੀ ਨਾਨਕਾ ਜਿਿਨ ਨਾਮੁ ਲਿਖਾਇਆ ਸਚੁ ॥
Blessed is the paper, blessed is the pen, blessed is the inkwell and the ink,
Blessed is the scribe, says Nanak, who writes the True Name.
– Guru Nanak Dev Ji, Sri Guru Granth Sahib, ang 1291
In awe, no doubt, of the vast collection of his master’s verses, it was Guru Angad Dev Ji who standardised a script to record and share the teachings, naming it ‘Gurmukhī’. ‘Mukh’ means face or mouth, so ‘Gurmukhī’ suggests teachings that were both spoken ‘from the mouth of the Guru’ and reflected a mind that was ‘gurmukh’ or ‘faced the direction of the Guru’. The newly systematised alphabet was based on locally used scripts; once formalised, the Gurmukhī script became the visible, sacred ‘face’ of Sikh teaching. Guru Angad then widely promoted literacy; in paintings, he is often depicted teaching children to read and write. Given the social limits on sharing knowledge at the time, this move was significant.
Making scripture accessible
Traditionally in India, the reading of Hindu sacred texts required knowledge of classical Sanskrit. Those lowest in the social hierarchy would not be permitted to learn, recite or, at times, even listen to passages of scripture. For those who had converted to Islam, to read the Qu’ran required learning Arabic, which differed from their home languages.
Meanwhile, in Europe over the Middle Ages, Christians proficient in Latin could read the Bible, whilst ordinary people would learn through sermons, plays and forms of religious art, until the Reformation enabled scripture to be written in vernacular or local, everyday languages.
Speaking various languages across Europe, for Jews, the learning of Hebrew linked them to their scriptural heritage and diasporic networks. People then used or had access to different languages for different purposes, in line with the norms and hierarchies of the time.
Guru Angad Dev Ji’s initiative had enabled people, irrespective of their social status, to access teachings that were profound in their poetry and wisdom yet spoke to them in a familiar ‘mother tongue’, rather than in a voice that was elite or aloof from their daily lives.
The Gurmukhi alphabet
The Gurmukhi alphabet, in turn, had an easy-to-learn, logical arrangement. It consisted of seven rows of five letters, hence it is also known as the paintī akharī (35 letters). Rows two to six follow a pattern, each having letters with similar sounds (e.g. a row of ‘k’ sounds, ‘ch’ sounds, ‘t’ sounds, ‘p’ sounds). The starting sound is modified in a pattern of ways (e.g., the basic ‘k’ sound is followed by ‘kh’, ‘g’, ‘gh’ and ‘ng’ sounds) and various vowel signs can then be added to formulate words. Words are generally pronounced just as they are spelt, without the need to learn complex spelling conventions, as we often have in the English writing system.
Today, the Gurmukhi script forms the modern Punjabi alphabet used in India. In Pakistan, Punjabi is written in a Perso-Arabic script known as Shahmukhī, devised by medieval Sufi poets. Both scripts helped the spoken language of Punjabi (now considered to be the world’s tenth most spoken language) to evolve into literary and scriptural language as well. After a tumultuous eighteenth century, indigenous education in the Punjab was revived by the Sikh ruler, Maharaja Ranjit Singh; before British rule, the Punjab kingdom was noted for its remarkable initiatives to spread multilingual literacy across its faith groups. Whilst some Sikhs are not literate in Gurmukhi, in the digital age there are many means to learn it and thereby engage directly with the ‘Shabad Guru’ – the enlightener in the form of the sacred word.
Gurbani as the mind’s mirror
ਗੁਰਮਤੀ ਆਪੁ ਪਛਾਣਿਆ ਰਾਮ ਨਾਮ ਪਰਗਾਸੁ ॥
By following the Guru’s wisdom, you will come to recognise your own self,
And the light of the Divine Name will start to radiate within.
– Guru Amardas Ji, Sri Guru Granth Sahib, ang 86
Relationships and dialogue within Gurbani
An inter-human dialogue - speaking to the mind
Responding to diverse people and to the compositions of Hindu and Muslim bhagats, the Gurus created an inter-religious, inter-cultural and inter-human dialogue. Sometimes their verses evoked close human bonds to share experiences from the heart (‘Anand bhei-ā merī māe…’ – ‘Oh my mother, I have found true bliss…’). Often, they took the form of a conversation with God, who is addressed as ‘You’, using the more intimate Punjabi pronoun ‘tū’ (‘Tū māt pitā…’ – ‘You are our Mother and Father…’). Frequently, the word ‘tū’ also addresses the human mind (‘Man tū jyot sarūp hai, āpnā mool pachān’ – ‘Oh my mind, you embody the Divine light, recognise your true origin’).
In Jap Ji Sahib, we picture the mind laden with jewels (paurī 6), unearthed by listening to the Guru’s teachings. The realm of humble effort (paurī 37) is Saram Khand, whose breath-taking beauty is generated when aspects of the mind – ‘surat, mat, man, budh’ – become refined. ‘Budh’ is the intellect, with its power to analyse, reason and discern. ‘Man’ (rhyming with the English ‘sun’) is from the word ‘manas’; processing experience through our senses, it steers how we think, feel and act, depending on our changing moods, fears, desires, insights, understandings and values. ‘Mat’ is the shape of our thinking or mindset, be it shallow or wise. ‘Surat’ is our intuitive awareness, based on the way our attention is attuned.
These were well-established, ancient concepts of the mind and Guru Nanak’s purpose was not to philosophise about them, but to motivate inward change, by understanding the nature of the ‘man’ and cultivating practices to uplift it. The ‘man’ can be conditioned by external norms, generated by countless intercrossing human minds spanning different social eras, impacted by different internal voices, depending on where its focus is directed. It can be led by ‘haumai’, our inflated sense of ‘I’. It can listen to the advice of the intellect and also of the heart, which carries its own intelligence. Importantly, the ‘man’ can either neglect the presence of the jyot, the Divine light, within us, or realise it and radiate its ‘rūp’, or beauty.
The verses of Gurbanī place a mirror before the mind. Like a critical friend, they point out its shortcomings, yet also encouragingly support it. In the daily prayer of Anand Sahib (‘Song of Bliss’), we hear the mind being addressed as both ‘wavering’ and as ‘beloved’ (‘Eh man chanchalā….eh man pyāreyā….’). Importantly, the mirror is held to the mind not to belittle or condemn it, but to give it confidence, vision, and courage to become its own best friend.
Identifying with the Source of All - speaking to the soul
Through waves of sacred poetry, Gurbani reveals that our ‘self’ is being continuously created through a constant interplay of influences. As the nature of this self is unravelled, we start to rethink our answers to the question ‘Who am I?’. I may build my identity on the things I have or roles I play in life, or the people and causes I associate with, but these I know are changeable and temporary, therefore can never completely define me. At the same time, my genetic make-up and the very words I speak took their form through biological and social processes far beyond myself; what I think of as ‘me’ is part of a shared human ‘us’.
I may think of ‘me’ as my physical self, but if I am able to observe it, I cannot be just my body. Neither am I just my thoughts and feelings, if I can observe these too. If intelligence and emotion run through my cells and my heart, neither can I be just my brain, as opposed to my body. Behind all these intertwined layers there sits an observer, an awareness or consciousness. This is the mysterious part of the self that eludes us, for even with the most sophisticated artificial intelligence, we cannot as humans create or install consciousness. For the Gurus, it is sparked by the ātmā, the ‘soul’ or our spiritual essence.
Instead of being defined by a narrow sense of ‘me’, or even a shared sense of ‘us’, the soul’s identity is rooted in an infinite ‘You’ – a Param-ātmā or ‘Supreme Soul’ whom we may call God. As living echoes of the Creator’s creativity, we are not passive beings, constrained by a fixed destiny or a circle of survival instincts. Likewise, just as the hukam or ‘Divine will’ exists, we each have a human ‘will’, which shapes the direction of our karam – all that we ‘do’ in terms of our intentions, choices, and deeds, which bring about their own consequences. Our free will can take its direction from haumai, the selfish ego, or write a different story for our lives, by perceiving the presence of the soul and nature of the hukam.
One word for the awareness sustained by the soul is ‘surat’. It echoes the word ‘sur’ for musical note, suggesting that this perception can be in or out of tune with the Divine. In his mountain-top conversation with the Siddh Yogis, Guru Nanak had pinpointed that the ‘surat’ is the ultimate disciple. Once awakened and attuned to the True Reality, this awareness transforms how we apply our minds and bodies to live a fulfilled and worthy life.
The non-material ‘soul’, powered by the ‘jyot’ or Divine Light, carries the imprints of our lived conduct over many lifetimes, which can dull or diminish its divinity. Partnering with the soul, the mind becomes its friend, assisting it towards a state of greater purity and richness before it makes its onward journey. Alongside its phenomenal capabilities, the mind makes choices and tendencies which easily form habits and mindsets. Knowledge alone cannot transform it; hence the Sikh Gurus sought to practically recalibrate and continually refresh the mind, through teachings that are to be contemplated, sung and wholeheartedly lived out in the world that surrounds us.
The soul as a jīv-istrī (soul-bride)
As humans, we can see ourselves as biological, spiritual, and social beings as well as differentiate ourselves as female or male. Biologically, we know that when life begins in the womb, all humans develop initially as females, through the primary influence of the X chromosome from the mother. This is until some weeks later when, if a Y chromosome is inherited from the father, it activates adaptations in the embryo that are physiologically male. Spiritually, in the verses of Gurbani, the inner being of both men and women is often portrayed as the female jīv-istrī, where jīv means the part of oneself that eternally lives (linked to jīvan, meaning life) and istrī means woman. When brought together, these biological insights and spiritual metaphors invite us to sense a female foundation to our being as humans, as does birth itself, through a mother. How we see ourselves and each other is also shaped by social and cultural perspectives, formed over time, about manhood, womanhood and our shared humanhood.
Gurbani teaches that the Divine transcends all categories of male and female. Pronouns are used sparingly and tend to be gender-free, which translations cannot quite capture when ‘He’ is repeated in English. Still, through masculine endings of verbs and adjectives, a male persona does often emerge for the Divine, even though God is clearly honoured as ‘Matā’ and ‘Pitā’ (Mother and Father). Since the Gurus taught metaphorically, they drew too on imagery from male and female roles in the cultural landscape of the time, such as the traditional bride, her awaited groom, or the husband who has had to travel and stay far from home. As a young bridal figure, the jīv-istrī’s practices of dressing up, adorning, and perfuming the body symbolise people’s religious rituals in their endeavours to unite with God. We learn that, like her, if our outward appearance simply masks vanity, pride or hypocrisy, we remain unfulfilled and disconnected from the Beloved, but as we project wisdom and virtue from within, this beauty naturally brings about the bliss of connection. Through the jīv-istrī, God is evoked as Lover, Groom and Husband. In these ways, she brings alive the spiritual journey as an embodied experience, involving the heart and senses, rather than a purely abstract search by an aloof mind. At times, the jīv-istrī sings out to sister souls, who represent fellow human beings in the wider human family. They in turn seek her counsel, to discover the path to unite with the Beloved. She also expresses her innermost hopes, fears, and joys to her mother, as a background figure who knows her lovingly from birth.
Gurbani: Scriptures and Prayers
Daily Bānis
To prepare the amrit or sanctified water for initiation, the tenth Guru had recited five compositions. These became the five set morning prayers of the nitnem bānīs (prayers for daily practice) for an initiated, or amritdhārī, Sikh. Recited in the early morning after bathing, they include Guru Nanak’s Jap Ji Sahib, followed by three bānīs by Guru Gobind Singh: Jāp Sahib, Tav-Prasād Savaiye and Benatī Chaupai, all from Sri Dasam Granth Sahib, a scriptural collection attributed to the ‘Tenth Master’. To conclude, the Anand Sahib or ‘Song of Bliss’, is by Guru Amardas, the third Guru.
In Sikh tradition, the nitnem bānīs provide a daily springboard to guide how we greet and shape the life granted to us. They also include the evening and night-time prayers of So Dar Rehrās and Kīrtan Sohila (which includes Guru Nanak Dev Ji’s Arti shabad), to close the day with gratitude, ongoing endurance, and humility. Sometimes to learn or recite these prayers can seem too challenging or mechanical. With a glimpse, though, of their deeper roles, they can be rediscovered and reembraced at any time with fresh eyes.
Mool Mantar: The root prayer
The Mool Mantar is the ‘root chant’ which holds the essence of all Sikh teaching. Mool means root, origin or essence. Mantar comes from the Sanskrit term ‘mantra’. It means a meditative chant which has the power to bring about a metamorphosis in the mind or ‘man’ (rhyming with ‘sun’). This is the part of the mind which steers how we think and live, in response to our conditioning and to changing inward and outward influences. By channelling the mind’s awareness, the repetition of a mantar is seen to generate subtle processes of transformation in one’s whole being, as one starts to identify with the vision, principles or essence of divinity which the mantar evokes.
Jap Ji Sahib
It was in Kartarpur that the practice of reciting Jap Ji Sahib, the first Sikh morning prayer, was established. This was a distillation of all Guru Nanak had observed and taught over his panoramic journeys, dialoguing with so many different people along the way. In some early scriptural collections, this bāni or composition is entitled ‘Jap Nishān’. Nishān means a mark, seal or insignia – so Jap Ji Sahib can be seen as the hallmark of Sikh teaching. It also suggests a stamp or passport, which enables one to step onto the Guru’s path. As the first composition of Sri Guru Granth Sahib, Jap Ji Sahib is the only one not set to a rāg or musical framework. All that follows afterwards is a rich and melodious elaboration of its teachings.
Jāp Sahib
As the first bānī, Jap Ji Sahib expands our view of existence, of what we should search for and value the most in life, and what counts as true success. Its view of God’s boundless nature, as encapsulated in the Mool Mantar, is the focus of the second bānī, Jāp Sahib, which majestically opens Sri Dasam Granth Sahib (just as Jap Ji Sahib opens Sri Guru Granth Sahib). With a series of changing rhythmic verse-forms, known as chhands, Jāp Sahib cascades with bursts of rhyming words and phrases that express karam nām – names of God’s abilities and attributes. These are joined by repetitions of words like ‘namo’ and ‘namastvang’, which are expressions of homage and reverence.
‘Jāp’ means a meditation for chanting and, with its 199 short verses, this bānī can be experienced like a river or an army of words coursing forwards, or a train of drumbeats or hoofbeats. Its verse headings have been interpreted to mirror warrior-like actions, like stepping (or riding horses) in a snakelike pattern (bhujang prayāt chhand) or defending with a sword or shield (bhagvati chhand, charpat chhand). Others reflect a pause from action, or a moment to evoke God from within (ruāl chhand, har bol manā chhand), or to take sweet reviving water (rasāval chhand). Another, with one-word lines, reflects the motion of single strikes (ek achhrī chand). In these ways, rhythms, rhymes, and expressions come together to clear the mind of limited, ego-bound thinking and to connect it instead with the One Divine Force without borders and limits, in which many opposite forces – such as separating and uniting, bringing darkness and light, or destroying and nurturing – are embraced.
Inspiring a valiant feeling of empowerment, or ‘bīr ras’, Jāp Sahib also moves fluidly between the terminology of Indic and Islamic traditions to evoke a spectacular Universal Reality that transcends customary labels, images or notions that limit or divide people’s vision. Positive affirmations of God’s qualities (as being benevolent or compassionate – kripāle, dayāle) weave in and out of depictions formed by negation (nridese, nribhese – not belonging to any country, not identified by particular attire; aganj, abhanj – beyond conquest, beyond harm). The words themselves feel alive and active as they break through limiting beliefs, adding to the bānī’s spirit of liberation and expansion. Compelling us to bow in wonder, awe and reverence, Jāp Sahib also ends by reminding us that this Divine Energy is ‘sadā ang sang-e ’ – forever by our side and part and parcel of our being.
Tav-Prasād Savaiye
Like Jāp Sahib, Tav-Prasād Savaiye and Benti Chaupai reflect the tenth Guru’s rich spiritual and martial education and learning of different literary and scriptural languages from a young age, for he was just moving past his teenage years when he composed these three bānīs, while he was based near the picturesque foothills of the Himalayas.
From here, yogis and ascetics would be heading for the mountains and various neighbouring ‘hill rajas’, who retained local rule under the Mughals, were both welcoming and wary of Guru Gobind Rai’s regal presence in the region. Tav-Prasād Savaiye is then a contemplation on the ephemeral nature of different searches for power – from kings with their riches, elephants and armies, to spiritual masters with their powers of self-discipline and self-denial, to warriors who seek the strength of mountains. Its gaze over the diverse panorama of humanity reminds us of Guru Nanak’s vast journeys. Here, the tenth Nanak conveys the very same message – that all religious rituals are empty without true love for the Creator and creation.
Benatī Chaupai
After this call for discernment and sincerity, we move into a Benatī Chaupai, a prayer composed of four-lined verses (chaupai) in the style of a supplication (benatī). Its spirit of deep humility is symbolised by the image in its opening lines, of the mind remaining fixed on the ‘feet’ of the Creator, seeking protection from all inward and outward challenges and adversities. A feeling of moving through history also runs through its words, as we hear the Guru beseech God to safeguard the collective ‘family’ of disciples in the face of a then uncertain and precarious future. Indeed, since it was first composed, Benatī Chaupai has carried Sikhs through the darkest times of persecution and war. To this day, it brings strength in all kinds of moments of personal and shared need. Through it, Sikhs remember that, if we seek spiritual empowerment, we must know too that nothing is ultimately in our hands and the strength to do anything rests in our Maker.
Anand Sahib
Anand Sahib depicts the rejuvenation of one’s whole self upon aligning with the Divine. As the five morning prayers come together, words of philosophical contemplation and poetic beauty become tools to arm, liberate and empower the mind at the start of each day, instilling feelings of hope, faith, trust, and joy. Ordinarily – be it through a form of exercise, creativity, or contemplation – a morning routine creates space for us to pause and reset before we step into the roles and preoccupations of our day.
Āsā di Vār
Whilst, through compositions like Barah Māh, the Gurus offered poetic analogies for the inner journey we both share as men and women, they also raised a voice against prejudices based on gender as well as social class or religion, as we see in the early morning spiritual ballad known popularly as Āsā di Vār. This opens in praise of the Guru, who holds the power to transform ordinary human beings (or mānas – from the word for human mind), irrespective of who they are, into spiritually exalted individuals (like devte, or Divine beings). As it switches from a cosmic view of the world to close-up observations of everyday life in late medieval Northern India, Āsā di Vār opens windows onto injustices, hypocrisy, and ignorance of the time, often with quite terse rhyming comments. It is in this context that Guru Nanak observes and questions why woman is dismissed as ‘mandā’ meaning ‘bad’ or ‘a lesser being’.
Usually, words like ‘nārī’ or ‘istrī’ denote ‘woman’ in Gurbani, yet, in this particular composition – where Guru Nanak lifts out and poetically interrogates many terms used in everyday life – the word ‘bhand’ is specifically repeated. With it, Guru Nanak seems to bring into play several contrasting connotations to make a point. Like the word for a container or vessel (bhāndā), bhand signifies woman’s child-bearing capacity. It can suggest a treasure-house (bhandār), and the role of one who stores and distributes food (bhandāran – see Jap Ji Sahib pauri 29). Bhand is also the form of a verb meaning ‘to make fortunate’ or ‘to cause to thrive’, yet this same verb also means ‘to deride, demean or put down’.
Through this interplay of connotations, then, we wonder if Guru Nanak chooses the word bhand to pinpoint people’s derogotary or purely functional view of women, whilst emphatically honouring them in the face of attitudes that dismissed women as hardly relevant or a hinderance to the spiritual path. As we see in the life of Guru Amardas Ji, the Sikh Gurus addressed various practices such as pardāh and satī, linked to histories of female abduction and infanticide and to wider social, cultural, religious, political and economic conditions of the time.
As part of the short glimpses of daily life observed in Āsā di Vār, these lines by no means summarise Sikh teachings on womanhood, although they are often quoted to do so. Since Āsā di Vār takes the form of a heroic ode to build courage, it would be routinely sung during later Guruships as a preparation for physical defence or battle with life’s bigger picture in mind. Whilst valour and bravery were widely celebrated as masculine virtues, the theme in Āsā di Vār is not manly power or worldly conquest. Through its melody and rhythm as well as poetic content, this motivational composition builds vision and strength to overcome the ego’s vices and uphold goodness in the game and daily battles of human life.