India before Guru Nanak

[Guest mehtab]

http://members.dancris.com/~sikh/chap02.html

CHAPTER 2

INDIA BEFORE GURU NANAK

After its climax, Buddhism started degenerating in India. Statues of Buddha and Budhisattvas became very common and were installed in their temples. Buddhist monks preached lesson of non-violence and non-resistance which made the people non-aggressive even in self defence.

When Buddhism was driven out of India, the Hindu society set up their own gods and goddesses and began to worship their stone images. The Hindu priests who had been for centuries, the self-made custodians of religion and its teachings, had reduced the religion to a mockery performing rites and rituals and superstitious ceremonies devoid of any sense and meaning.

"The Hindu leaders neglected to teach the spiritual realities to the people at large who were sunk in superstitions and materialism. Religion became confused with caste distinction and taboos about eating and drinking.....",

writes Dr. S. Radhakrishnan, a philosopher and former President of India.

The Hindu society was over-ridden with caste system. The religion became the privilege only of the upper class called the Brahmans. The sacred religious books were neither accessible to the other classes nor could the people understand them because they were written mostly in Sanskrit, a language not spoken by the masses. Religious reading, writing and teaching was strictly the monopoly of the Brahmans. The lowest of the lowest class was called the Untouchables. A touch or even a shadow of these untouchab

les seemed to pollute the higher classes.

Such was the condition of Hindu India when Muslim invaders from the west began pouring in large numbers one after the other. For the Muslim invaders, from Mahmood of Gazni in the eleventh century to the Moghuls in the sixteenth century (at the time of Guru Nanak), the Punjab was always the gateway of India. All these Muslim invaders massacred men, women and children without mercy, plundered their homes, desecrated and demolished their temples and robbed the wealth of these temples. The Hindus were converted to Islam at the point of the sword. Nobles, scholars, sufies, poets and philosophers who also came along with these invaders, settled in the various parts of India, and they laid the foundation of Indo-Muslim culture in the country.

Many Muslim historians have given account of the happenings of that time. A few examples of the treatment of Hindus by the Mohammadan conquerors of India, are given below:

Shahab-ul-Din, King of Gazni (1170-1206), put Prithwi Raj, King of Ajmer and Delhi, to death in cold blood. He massacred thousands of the inhabitants of Ajmer who opposed him , reserving the remainder for slavery (The Kamiu-t Tawarikh by Asir).

In the Taj-ul-Ma'asir by Hassn Nizam-i-Naishapuri, it is stated that when Qutb-ul-Din Aibak (1194-1210) conquered Meerat, he demolished all the Hindu temples of the city and erected mosques on their sites. In the city of Aligarh, he converted Hindu inhabitants to Islam by the sword and beheaded all those who adhered to their own religion.

Abdulla Wassaf writes in his Tazjiyat-ul-Amsar wa Tajriyat ul Asar that when Ala-ul-Din Khilji (1295-1316) captured the city of Kambayat at the head of the gulf of Cambay, he killed the adult male Hindu inhabitants for the glory of Islam, set flowing rivers of blood, sent the women of the country with all their gold, silver, and jewels, to his own home, and made about twenty thousand maidens his private slaves.

Ala-ul-

Din once asked his Qazi, what was the Mohammadan law prescribed for the Hindus. The Qazi replied, "Hindus are like the mud; if silver is demanded from them, they must with the greatest humility offer gold. If a Mohammadan desire to spit into a Hindu's mouth, the Hindu should open it wide for the purpose. God created the Hindus to be slaves of the Mohammadans. The Prophet hath ordained that, if the Hindus do not accept Islam, they should be imprisoned, tortured, finally put to death, and their property confiscated."

Sayad Mohammad Latif writes in his history of the Punjab, "Great jealousy and hatred existed those days between the Hindus and Mohammadans and the whole non-Muslim population was subject to persecution by the Mohammadan rulers."

Bhai Gurdas, a Sikh scholar, writes, "My Lord, it is strange that the people of Kalyug (dark age or the age of falsehood) have developed the attitude of a dog and they take pleasure in swallowing ill-gotten things. The rulers commit sins and those who are herdsmen, are killing the sheep themselves. The people being ignorant are not in a position to discriminate between truth and falsehood. Those who pose as benefactors are engaged in amassing wealth by fraudulent means. Love between man and woman is based on money, they meet at pleasure and depart at will. The Qazi who occupies the seat of justice, accepts bribes and then passes unjust orders."

Guru Nanak describes the situation as:

'Kings are butchers Cruelty their knife, and Sense of duty and responsibility have taken wings and vanished.' (Slok Mohalla 1, p-145)

It has always been believed that whenever the Righteousness vanishes from this world and the Falsehood takes its place, there has been a call from the Heaven to restore peace and justice on earth. Out of the dark clouds of falsehood, hypocrisy, injustice, cruelty and b

igotry, there came a ray of sunshine from the Heaven as described by Bhai Gurdas, a Sikh apostle:

"Heaven at last heard the prayers of the people, Guru Nanak was sent to the world. The disciples met and drank the nectar of his Lotus feet, And realized the Divine in this age of materialism. Guru Nanak re-established Dharma, All castes he merged into one caste of man. The rich and the poor he brought on one level, From this Founder of Humanity a new race of love goes forth;

In humility they bow down to each other. The Master and the disciple became one, His song of Nam gives us a new life, He is the Saviour in this age of materialism.

Nanak came, the world was lighted, The sun rose, the darkness disappeared. Wherever the Guru put his foot, It became the temple of worship.

The far-famed seats of the Sidhas changed their names,

The Yoga-houses became Guru-houses. Humanity resounded with his divine hymns; In every house of the disciple, the Lord was worshipped.

The Guru went in all directions, Seeking his own all over the earth. A river of love and peace Flows in us singing his song." (Bhai Gurdas, // 1-pauri 23,27)

Heaven at last heard the cries and prayers of the oppressed and there appeared the Savior of Humanity, Prophet of Peace, Fountain of Heavenly Love and Ocean of Virtue in the name of GURU NANAK, the founder of Sikh religion.

[Khalsa4ever]

vwihgurU jI kw Kwlsw!

vwihgurU jI kI &iqh!!

So True... Dhan Dhan Sri Guru Nanak Dev Jee!!

and Dhan Dhan to the future hope that Sikhi will show to the world!

vwihgurU jI kw Kwlsw!

vwihgurU jI kI &iqh!!

[DhadiMania]

yep, all tru, loadsa cults appeared. n 2days biggest cults r RSS n Arya Samaj that r brainwashin other ppl n religions.

like always apna rochak has summat gud 2 say.

thanks.

[Simran9]

we think that kalyug is present and at its worst right now but this is something that was there all the time as i

s evident in the above story.

[Guest noonespecial]

sathigur naanak pragattiaa mittee dhhu(n)dhh jag chaanan hoaa||

With the emergence of the true Guru Nanak, the mist cleared and the light scattered all around.

jiou(n) kar sooraj nikaliaa thaarae shhapae a(n)dhhaer paloaa||

As if at the sun rise the stars disappeared and the darkness dispelled.

si(n)gh bukae miragaavalee bha(n)nee jaaeae n dhheer dhharoaa||

With the roar of the lion in the forest the flocks of escaping deer now cannot have endurance.

ithhai baabaa pair dhharai poojaa aasan thhaapan soaa||

Wherever Baba put his feet, a religious place was erected and established.

sidhh aasan sabh jagath dhae naanak aadh mathae jae koaa||

All the siddh-places now have been renamed on the name of Nanak.

ghar ghar a(n)dhar dhharamasaal hovai keerathan sadhaa visoaa||

Everyhome has become a place of dharma where singing.

baabae thaarae chaar chak na kha(n)dd prithhamee sachaa dtoaa||

Baba liberated all four directions and nine divisions of earth.

guramukh kal vich paragatt hoaa ||aa||

Gurmukh (Guru Nanak) has emerged in this kaliyug, the dark age.

[Simran9]

It has always been believed that whenever the Righteousness vanishes from this world and the Falsehood takes its place, there has been a call from the Heaven to restore peace and justice on earth. Out of the dark clouds of falsehood, hypocrisy, injustice, cruelty and bigotry, there came a ray of sunshine from the Heaven as described by Bhai Gurdas, a Sikh apostle:

"Heaven at last heard the prayers of the people, Guru Nanak was sent to the world. The disciples met and drank the nectar of his Lotus feet, And realized the Divine in this age of materialism. Guru Nanak re-established Dharma, All castes he merged into one caste of man. The rich and the poor he brought on one level, From this Founder of Humanity a new race of love goes forth;

what happened to sikhi? don't say rss cuz i think rss is not that old. what happened to sikhs after Guru Gobind Singh ji? or what about during and after maharaja ranjit singh's raj?

how did caste system get accepted by sikhs when all this was banned by gurmat? how did hair cutting become acceptable when it is against gurmat? look in punjab: there are God knows how many beauty parlors every where and women are threading,waxing, cutting hair. boys (and even girls) are drugged to the limit like crazy, on top of that boys are mona everywhere i looked.

and somebody in another thread said there was dancing in harmandir sahib . forget that, look at the modern day wedding in punjab: after wedding there is party in wedding palace and they hire women to dance for them! And this is done not just by "sikhs" but even ppl you would think are "gursikhs." only difference btwn punjab and foreign country is there they hire women and here women dance at their own will for free.

ppl are hardcore punjabis, they have tons of punjabi pride, and they are bigtime bhangra fans.....what happened to being a hardcore sikh? ppl will die for bhangra, why not for sikhi? (yes i know ppl have died for sikhi, but a lot less compared to ppl dying for other causes). ppl will sacrifice anything to be at a party to dance, get drunk, check out opposite gender folks.....why ppl not willing to sacrifice time to go to gurdwara and be in sadh sangat?

ya'll know all that is messed up with our ppl, i don't wanna waste your time with the endless list.

i just wanna know what happend to our Guru's sikhs back then and why they allowed so much craapp to get into their lives to the point where now i hardly see a real Gursikh. :umm: @ :D