Fundamentalism and the Sikh Religious Tradition by T.N. Madan

and equality to woman, which till today no other religion has granted. Against the rigidity
of the varanashram dharma and the institution of caste and pollution, he from the very
first day of his mission, accepted and practised social equality and brotherhood of man.
Against the world being mithya and a suffering, he found it to be real, beautiful and the
realm for the spiritual growth of man. Against tapas, ritualism and meditation alone, he
prescribed the primacy of work and activity, emphasizing that one's religious assessment
was based on moral deeds in this world. Against the ideal of personal salvation or
moksha, he prescribed the goal of carrying out the Altruistic Will of God in the world.
The contrast of approach to life is evident from the following hymns of Guru Nanak and
of Sankra.
Guru Nanak: "The sun and moon, O Lord, are Thy lamps; the firmament Thy
salver; the orbs of the stars the pearls encased in it... The perfume of the sandal is Thine
incense; Thy wind Thy fan; all the forests are Thy flowers, O Lord of light. What a
wonderful worship is this; O God, my mind is fascinated with Thy lotus feet, as the
bumble bee with the flower; night and day I thirst for them. Give the water of Thy favour
to the sarang (bird) Nanak, so that my heart may dwell in Thy Name."
Sankra : "I am not the doer, how can there be either bondage or release for me ?
I am neither male, nor female, nor sexless. I am the peaceful one, whose form is selfeffulgent,
powerful radiance. I am neither a child, nor a young man, nor an ancient; nor
am I of any caste. I do not belong to one of the four life-stages. I am the Blessed Peaceful
One, who is the only cause of the origin and the dissolution of the world."
While Guru Nanak is bewitched by the beauty of His creation, and sees in the
panorama of nature a lovely scene of the worshipful adoration of the Lord, Sankra in his
hymn, rejects the reality of the world and treats himself as the sole Reality. Zimmer feels
that "such holy megalomania goes past the bounds of sense. With Sankra, the grandeur of
the supreme human experience becomes intellectualised, and reveals its inhuman
sterility."
Consequently, instead of a salvation system for a few individuals, Guru Nanak,
from the very beginning, started organising sangat (a society) or panth. On the one hand,
he meticulously enumerated all the faults in the social, administrative and political
systems of his times, and, on the other hand, he laid down an ethical system and duties
that could fulfil the religious objectives and goals he had in view. An important fact is
that, since a rigid tradition of 3000 years of dichotomy
could not be demolished, and a new and motivated society created, in a decade or two, it
is he who created a system of succession, and advised his successors actively to organise
and lead a Panth.
It is logical for every religious system, from Moses down to Guru Nanak, to
follow the spiritual experience of the Founder and his concept of God or Reality. In fact,
the entire religious ethics of Guru Nanak, or for that matter, of any Prophet, is based on
his concept of God. The Guru Granth says, "Friends ask me what is the mark of the Lord,
He is all Love; the rest He is ineffable." Guru Nanak calls God "Ocean of virtues and
values", His God being Loving and Altruistic the world in which He expresses His
attributes, automatically becomes real. The goal of life is to follow the Altruistic Will of
God, and the assessment of man is based on his virtuous deeds.God is intimately
interested in the spiritual growth of man. Consequently, it is Guru Nanak who says, "If