Kabir

File:Saint Kabir On A Magazine Cover.jpg

Modern depiction of saint Kabir on the cover of Shree Kabir Gyanamrit, a Hindi magazine.

Kabīr (also: Kabīra, Hindi: कबीर, Urdu:کبير‎, Gurmukhī: ਕਬੀਰ) (1440—1518) was a fascinating, individualistic and iconoclastic Indian mystic whose teachings stressed two primary themes: the possibility of radical union with the Divine and the utter contingency of all religious and ideological distinctions. Though many details of his life remain shrouded in mystery, certain biographical elements (such as his low caste birth and his occupation as a weaver) are common to all versions of his biography.

Despite his antinomian avoidance of particularistic religious commitments, Kabir was posthumously "claimed" by various religious sects, including the Hindu Sants, the Sikhs, and the Muslim Sufis. The syncretic absorptions of the poet's teachings were facilitated by the fact that he was, himself, illiterate, which meant that his poetic visions were only indirectly recorded. As a result, interpreters from various traditions, each working within their own vernacular tongues, each recorded their own versions of Kabir—a process that generated three discrete textual corpuses, each with their own particular perspectives. Regardless of this proliferation of texts, the mystic sage's general emphasis on the attainment of oneness with the divine is never lost, and continues to resonate throughout all recensions of his poetic oeuvre.

Biographical Sketch

As mentioned above, few concrete facts are available concerning the life of the historical Kabīr. Even the date of his birth is uncertain, with more historical sources suggesting the year 1440 C.E. and more hagiographical ones arguing for 1398. It is commonly thought that he was raised by a family of recently converted Muslim weavers, though some traditions suggest that he had been (miraculously?) born to a brahmin widow. His early spiritual awakening, achieved in spite of his lowly status, was generally thought to have been brought about through the patronage of the celebrated Hindu ascetic, Râmânanda, who brought to Northern India the religious revival that Râmânuja, the great twelfth-century reformer of Brâhmanism had initiated in the South. Additionally, he was apparently a friend, teacher or disciple of Guru Nanek Dev, the founder of Sikhism. Despite these spiritually potent associates, some hagiographies suggest that Kabir's life was disrupted by persecution at the hands of the Muslim aristocracy, which necessitated his frequent exilic wanderings throughout the countryside.

One of the most potent hagiographical tales surrounding the mystic concerns the events surrounding his death, whose significance derives from its complimentarity with Kabir's teachings on religious factionalism. In it, the sage has recently passed away and his devotees, who numbered from both the Hindu and Muslim traditions, were undecided about how to prepare his remains. This immediately bred contention, as the Muslim called for him to be buried, while the Hindus requested that he be cremated. The dispute was aggravated by the fact that neither group could even agree on which faith Kabir had himself been devoted to. However, when they finally returned to the tent that Kabir had expired in, they found the body is missing and that only a pile of flower petals remained. The legend concludes by stating that this occurence (understandably) resolved the conflict, and that both groups looked upon the event as an instance of divine intervention.

The Sant Tradition: Overview

Regardless of the sage's feelings about religious identities, he is most often associated with Sant Mat, a loosely related group of teachers (Sanskrit: gurus) that achieved prominence in the northern part of the Indian sub-continent in the 13th century. Their teachings were revolutionary on two fronts: theologically, they centered on an inward-directed, loving devotion to a divine principle (bhakti); and socially, they stressed egalitarianism, as opposed to the qualitative distinctions of the Hindu caste hierarchy, and of the religious differences between Hindus and Muslims.

The Sants were not homogeneous, as identification with the group was often established retrospectively, based upon the congruence between the exponent's presentation of bhakti (devotion) and the description of the same path (bhakti marga) in the Bhagavad Gita. Sharing as few conventions with each other as with the orthodox versions of the traditions that they challenged, the Sants appear more as a diverse collection of spiritual personalities than a specific religious tradition, although many did acknowledge a common spiritual root. Indeed, this heterogeneity of thought and practice meant that it was common for the Sants to be respected across religious boundaries, as "bhakti became the way of salvation for everyone: women and children, low-castes and outcastes, could become fully recognized members of the bhakti movement. Some of the great bhaktas are saints for Hindus, Muslims, and Sikhs alike."

The first generation of teachers reliably characterized as north Indian Sants, a group that included Kabir, appeared in the region of Benares in the 15th century CE. Preceding them were two notable 13th and 14th century figures, Namdev and Ramananda. The latter, a Vaishnava ascetic, was traditionally thought to have initiated Kabir, Raidas, and other sants. However, Ramanand's story is told differently by his lineage of Ramanandi monks, by other Sants active in the same period, and later by the Sikhs. The little that is known of the guru suggests that he stressed a religion of love, that he accepted students of all castes, a fact that was contested by the orthodox Hindus of that time, and that his students formed the first generation of Sants.

Philosophical Themes

The basic religious principles espoused by Kabir are simple. According to Kabir, all life is an interplay of two spiritual principles. One is the personal soul (Jivatma) and the other is God (Paramatma). It is Kabir's view that salvation is the process of bringing into union these two divine principles. The social and practical manifestation of Kabir's philosophy has rung through the ages. It represented a synthesis of Hindu, and Muslim concepts. From Hinduism he accepts the concept of reincarnation and the law of Karma. From Islam he takes the affirmation of the single god and the rejection of caste system and idolatry. Not only has Kabir influenced Muslims and Hindus but he is one of the major inspirations behind Sikhism as well.

His greatest work is the Bijak (that is, the Seedling), an idea of the fundamental one. This collection of poems demonstrates Kabir's own universal view of spirituality. His vocabulary is replete with ideas regarding Brahman and Hindu ideas of karma and reincarnation. His Hindi was a very vernacular, straightforward kind, much like his philosophies. He often advocated leaving aside the Qur'an and Vedas and to simply follow Shahaj path, or the Simple/Natural Way to oneness in God. He believed in the Vedantic concepts of atman and therefore spurned the orthodox Hindu societal caste system and worship of statues, thus showing clear belief in both bhakti and sufi ideas. The major part of Kabir's work as a Bhagat was collected by the fifth Sikh guru, Guru Arjun Dev, and forms a section of the holy Sikh scripture "Guru Granth Sahib". According to legendary accounts Kabir and Guru Nanak had met once.

While many ideas reign as to who his living influences were, the only Guru of whom he ever spoke was Ramananda, a Vaishnav saint whom Kabir claimed to have taken initiation from in the form of the "Rama" mantra.

Poetry

"The poetry of mysticism might be defined on the one hand as a temperamental reaction to the vision of Reality: on the other, as a form of prophecy. As it is the special vocation of the mystical consciousness to mediate between two orders, going out in loving adoration towards God and coming home to tell the secrets of Eternity to other men; so the artistic self-expression of this consciousness has also a double character. It is love-poetry, but love-poetry which is often written with a missionary intention. Kabîr's songs are of this kind: out-births at once of rapture and of charity. Written in the popular Hindi, not in the literary tongue, they were deliberately addressed—like the vernacular poetry of Jacopone da Todì and Richard Rolle—to the people rather than to the professionally religious class; and all must be struck by the constant employment in them of imagery drawn from the common life, the universal experience. It is by the simplest metaphors, by constant appeals to needs, passions, relations which all men understand—the bridegroom and bride, the guru and disciple, the pilgrim, the farmer, the migrant bird—that he drives home his intense conviction of the reality of the soul's intercourse with the Transcendent. There are in his universe no fences between the "natural" and "supernatural" worlds; everything is a part of the creative Play of God, and therefore—even in its humblest details—capable of revealing the Player's mind."

His poems resonate with praise for the true guru who reveals the divine through direct experience, and denounced more usual ways of attempting god-union such as chanting, austerities etc. His verses, which being illiterate he never expressed in writing, often began with some strongly worded insult to get the attention of passers-by. Kabir has enjoyed a revival of popularity over the past half century as arguably the most acceptable and understandable of the Indian Saints, with an especial influence over spiritual traditions such as that of Sant Mat and Radha Soami. Prem Rawat ('Maharaji') also refers frequently to Kabir's songs and poems as the embodiment of deep wisdom.

O SERVANT, where dost thou seek Me?

Lo! I am beside thee.
I am neither in temple nor in mosque: I am neither in Kaaba nor in Kailash:
Neither am I in rites and ceremonies, nor in Yoga and renunciation.
If thou art a true seeker, thou shalt at once see Me: thou shalt meet Me in a moment of time.
Kabîr says, "O Sadhu! God is the breath of all breath."

Are you looking for me? I am in the next seat.

My shoulder is against yours.
you will not find me in the stupas, not in Indian shrine

rooms, nor in synagogues, nor in cathedrals:

not in masses, nor kirtans, not in legs winding

around your own neck, nor in eating nothing but vegetables.

When you really look for me, you will see me instantly —

you will find me in the tiniest house of time.

Kabir says: Student, tell me, what is God?

He is the breath inside the breath.

Religious Themes and Affiliations

It is a fruitless endeavor, indeed one that Kabir himself disliked, to classify him as Hindu or Muslim, Sufi or Bhakta. The legends surrounding his lifetime attest to his strong aversion to established religions. From his poems, expressed in homely metaphors and religious symbols drawn indifferently from Hindu and Mohammedan belief, it is impossible to say of their author that he was Brâhman or Sûfî, Vedântist or Vaishnavite. He is, as he says himself, "at once the child of Allah and of Râm." In fact, Kabir always insisted on the concept of Koi bole Ram Ram Koi Khudai..., which means that someone may chant the Hindu name of God and someone may chant the Muslim name of God, but God is the one who made the whole world.

In Kabir's wide and rapturous vision of the universe he never loses touch with the common life. His feet are firmly planted upon earth; his lofty and passionate apprehensions are perpetually controlled by the activity of a sane and vigorous intellect, by the alert commonsense so often found in persons of real mystical genius. The constant insistence on simplicity and directness, the hatred of all abstractions and philosophizings, the ruthless criticism of external religion: these are amongst his most marked characteristics. God is the Root whence all manifestations, "material" and "spiritual," alike proceed; and God is the only need of man—"happiness shall be yours when you come to the Root." Hence to those who keep their eye on the "one thing needful," denominations, creeds, ceremonies, the conclusions of philosophy, the disciplines of asceticism, are matters of comparative indifference. They represent merely the different angles from which the soul may approach that simple union with Brahma which is its goal; and are useful only insofar as they contribute to this consummation. So thorough-going is Kabîr's eclecticism, that he seems by turns Vedântist and Vaishnavite, Pantheist and Transcendentalist, Brâhman and Sûfî. In the effort to tell the truth about that ineffable apprehension, so vast and yet so near, which controls his life, he seizes and twines together—as he might have woven together contrasting threads upon his loom—symbols and ideas drawn from the most violent and conflicting philosophies and faiths.

Kabir is revered as Satguru by the Kabirpanthi spiritual group, based in Maghar.

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Courtney, David (PhD). Kabir, Musician Saint of India. Retrieved June 20, 2007.
• Dharwadker, Vinay. "Kabir" in Religions of India in Practice. Edited by Donald J. Lopez. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995. ISBN 0691043256.
• Gold, Daniel. "Clan and Lineage amongst the Sants: Seed, Substance, Service" in The Sants: Studies in a Devotional Tradition of India. Edited by K. Schomer and W.H. McLeod. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1987. ISBN 0-9612208-0-5
• Hees, Peter. Indian Religions: A Historical Reader of Spiritual Expression and Experience. New York: NYU Press, 2002. ISBN 0-8147-3650-5
• Kabir. Songs of Kabir. Translated by Rabindranath Tagore. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1915.
• Klostermaier, Klaus K. A Survey of Hinduism. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1994.
• Lipner, Julius J. Hindus: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices. London: Routledge, 1994. ISBN 0-415-05181-9
• Mitchell, Stephen. The Enlightened Heart: An Anthology of Canadian Poetry. New York: HarperCollins, 1989. ISBN 0-06-092053-X
• Vaudeville, Charlotte. "Kabir" in The Encyclopedia of Religion. Editor-in-Chief, Mircea Eliade. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1987. ISBN 0029097908.
• Walker, Benjamin. "Kabir" in Hindu World: An Encyclopedic Survey of Hinduism (Vol. I). London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1968. ISBN 8172231792 (1995 edition).
• Woodhead, Linda and Fletcher, Paul. Religion in the Modern World: Traditions and Transformations. London: Routledge, 2001. ISBN 0-415-21784-9.

See also

• Bhakti
• Bhakti movement
• Sant Mat

External links

Articles about Kabir

• Overview of Kabir's life and impact - Retrieved June 21, 2007.
• Life Sketch of Kabir - Retrieved June 21, 2007.
• Homepage of the Canadian Kabir Association - Featuring various essays, plus the Bijak and other writings of Guru Kabir online - Retrieved June 21, 2007.

Selections of Kabir's Poetry

• Kabir at Kavita Kosh - Retrieved June 21, 2007.
• The Anurag Sagar, ("Ocean of Love,") by Kabir - Retrieved June 21, 2007.
• Some dohas of Kabir - Retrieved June 21, 2007.
• 26 of Kabir's Saying - Retrieved June 21, 2007.
• Project Gutenberg: Songs of Kabir as translated by Rabindranath Tagore - Retrieved June 21, 2007.
• Poems of Kabir - Retrieved June 21, 2007.
• Kabir's dohas at sacred-texts.com - Retrieved June 21, 2007.
• Bhagat Kabir (contains a link to Kabir's poetry in Hindi) - Retrieved June 21, 2007.

Articles about the Kabir Pantha Movement

• www.kabirchaura.com, Website of the Kabir Chaura, home of the Panthi's - Retrieved June 21, 2007.

Articles about Kabir in Sikhism

• Bhagat Kabir's contribution to the Sikh Holy Guru Granth Sahib - Retrieved June 21, 2007.

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