Concept Of God In Sikhism Part 2

[KOOKAR]

Guru Nanak Dev Ji's definition of god and the universe are unparalled in Eastern mysticismTHe following passages from the Mool Mantar from Sri Japji Sahib are self explanatory.

There is but One God,

The Eternal All pervading Divine Spirit

The Creator, The Supreme Being, The omnipotent

Without fear, without enmity,

Immortal reality

Unborn, Self existent

True in the timeless beginning

True in the past infinity of ages

Even now,He is true

and forever He shall be the eternal truth

None can describe his bounties;none can comprehend His infinity Guru Nanak writes,"Just as river cannot size up the ocean, in the same way, man cannot assert God's greatness"

"He creates the universe and then reveals himself

To us and in us, He made himself manifest"

The necessary implicaton of the above attributes of god, particularly that He is not subject to birth and death is that according to Guru Nanak, there can be no incarnation of God and the Hindu theory that God appears in the world every now and then in the garb of a human being, with a view to helping and guiding his creatures is not tenable

[Bundha]

I would humbly say that when in gurbani it says 'Ajhooni' it means that Akaal Purkh is free from the cycle of births and deaths.

Akaal is within his creation and outside of it. He can weave himself in and out as He likes, He has no restrictions. To say that

Akaal cannot take birth puts a limit on Him, He can take 'birth' and 'die', although of course He is not dead and can never die,

but he can go through the leela of this world for the purpose of showing us the way.

Guru Granth Sahib Ji says :

As long as the destiny written upon my forehead was not activated, I wandered around lost, running in all directions.

I was drowning in the horrible world-ocean of this Dark Age of Kali Yuga, and my remorse would never have ended.

O Mat'huraa, consider this essential truth: to save the world, the Lord incarnated Himself.

Whoever meditates on Guru Arjun Dayv, shall not have to pass through the painful womb of reincarnation ever again. ||6||

Guru Gobind Singh Ji says that the two (Akaal Purkh and Guru Ji) became One, so there is no difference between Guru Ji and Akaal,

yet Guru Ji then took birth in the form of a human to propogate Akaal Purkh Jis panth.

[Only five]

I agree with Bundha. But unborn is not a wrong of a translation of what God is.

unborn- existing without birth or beginning

So it doesn't fit ajooni, which is, God is not subject to the cycle of birth and death.

Ajooni says nothing about God can or can't enter into cycle of birth and death. And this is where most miss the subtle bit.

[humkire]

The most interesting bit, has been missed out because that translation in its aim to limit itself to the definition of God cut out on 'gurprasad ' after explaining 'ajoonee '' and ''saibhang'' and went straight on to ''aad sach.....'' In fact gurprasad HAS to be included, if not such a God would be omnipresent, onmiscient, omnipotent etc but not accessible. The word Gurprasad in mulmantar authoritatively qualifies the fact that such a supreme Master Creator of the universe who is inimical to none, is infact accessible to His creatures through Guru, the manifestation of that aspect of God's 'personality' by which Gurujee through shabad/naam/amrit/grace connects us in surrender to God. Wah! 'gurprasad ' is a very exciting aspect of the 'personality' of God because it means God the KING is not leaving us on our own to just look at Him hopelessly without any means to 'touch' our Maker and Creator. At the word Gurprasad the dice is rolled towards us, the string is hung down from heaven, a Divine Hand is extended to us to put our finger on Gurujee's holy finger to begin our Sikhi journey to be lifted up into heaven so we can kiss and worship the Lotus Feet of our Lover, His Majesty, God the Divine Husband. Sikhi is birthed with gurprasad. How awesome is that!