Christmas trees in houses of Sikhs

[N30S1NGH]

I think both sides have a good argument.

While we are at it, what you guys think about sikh having an specific room set up with inter-faith pictures/iconography of people, cultures, religions across the globe as a home decor and an gesture showing respect to all relgions/cultures/people across the globe.?

[Only five]

If decorating a specific tree didn't make a difference on you then why do it in first place? (no gain or loss) The fact you are putting up a specific tree means it does mean something to you. Here is an example. Bhagat Namdev ji Maharaj questions the Hindus in Gurbani, why are you worshipping one stone and the other stone you kick in the street? Where is the logic in your practice. Bhagat Ji was trying to make the Hindus realize that a stone is a stone and nothing more.

If Bhagat Namdev Ji Maharaj was here right now in Sargun Saroop he will ask the same question to the Christmas tree followers, but just replace stone with tree idol. Here on this site members are trying to make the attached members to a Christmas tree realize a tree is a tree. Why discriminate between them and say one is higher for a certain amount of days by decorating it and glorifying it in your living room.

Again if it didn't mean anything then that plastic tree or real tree would have stayed on the shelves of a store or in the ground and served its purpose as a tree.

[luckysingh99]

We only end up in the celebrations, trees, presents and chocolates ..etc... because it is the western culture and the majority are participating.

The reason why trees, cards and gifts end up in sikh homes is because we are joining in a celebration that the majority of the society we live in are all active in.

We get to enjoy the holiday along with everyone else. It becomes a chance to visit relatives and friends and express some love and affection to family.

I'm quite sure that whilst my kids are young, i'm not going to spoil the fun of their holidays by banning gifts, banning trees, banning cards..etc.. -It does NOT affect my or mt kids attitude towards any religion in any way.

We don't have a tree because we believe in it, we simply have it because every kid in school has one to go home to !!

At this time of the year they are celebrating the martyrdoom of sahibzadies at Fategarh sahib. The majority of people that live there will take part along with the majorities. This includesw all the christians and other faiths that live there.

But none of the sikhs raise any questions over there if there christian neigbhours are joining in or helping to cook some food for the locals ! Then why do we raise questions when it is the other way round over here ?

I don't have a problem or any fear of losing my faith by having a christmas tree or by giving presents, and I will happily wish everyone a merry christmas.

I think the fear for getting coverted to any other religion is only as strong as it is because of the weakness inside you about your own faith.

[Hazoor]

Agree with the poster above.

For me, the tree is not along the lines of a moorti of a deity. In the eyes of some it may be but it comes down to the person.

I am not trying to take part in some ritual, if I was I'd just be straight forward and do it and not beat round a bush (maybe you see it and I don't).

Maybe I'm not at your level Only Five, a tree is currently not affecting my avasta (or lack of it). Years of exposure to elements of other faiths has not chipped away at my faith, it has cemented it over time.

As far as how a tree will effect my children, having been exposed to this all my life and still being sent to Punjabi classes before I started state education, being sent to Santhia classes, attending camps as a camper and then organiser for around 2 decades; I think I can confidently say my folks ensured we knew who we are alongside being exposed to the traditions of the country I was born and growing up in.

I hope to emulate what they did, I mean what's the worst that's happened?! I have a tree, it could be a lot worse!

(I could be at the Gurdwara lighting candles/divas on Bandi Chor Diwas!)

Jesting aside, I do get your point (Only Five) but don't agree that some tree worship ritual is taking place at my house.

[Only five]

We only end up in the celebrations, trees, presents and chocolates ..etc... because it is the western culture and the majority are participating.

The reason why trees, cards and gifts end up in sikh homes is because we are joining in a celebration that the majority of the society we live in are all active in.

We get to enjoy the holiday along with everyone else. It becomes a chance to visit relatives and friends and express some love and affection to family.

I'm quite sure that whilst my kids are young, i'm not going to spoil the fun of their holidays by banning gifts, banning trees, banning cards..etc.. -It does NOT affect my or mt kids attitude towards any religion in any way.

We don't have a tree because we believe in it, we simply have it because every kid in school has one to go home to !!

At this time of the year they are celebrating the martyrdoom of sahibzadies at Fategarh sahib. The majority of people that live there will take part along with the majorities. This includesw all the christians and other faiths that live there.

But none of the sikhs raise any questions over there if there christian neigbhours are joining in or helping to cook some food for the locals ! Then why do we raise questions when it is the other way round over here ?

I don't have a problem or any fear of losing my faith by having a christmas tree or by giving presents, and I will happily wish everyone a merry christmas.

I think the fear for getting coverted to any other religion is only as strong as it is because of the weakness inside you about your own faith.

I'm not going to beat a dead horse, but you made two new points that I didn't see earlier.

First NEW point: "my kids are just having fun and i don't want to spoil their fun." You spoke like many parents would react, thinking they are doing the best for their kids. However we can look at the lives of Gursikhs in the 80's to the lives of the sons of Satguru Sri Guru Granth Sahib ji Maharaj. Gursikhs kids and Guru Sahibs kids grew up in a environment where other religions festivals where up and going in full swing and obviously their kids were well aware of these festivals. However none of their kids participated in holi. Throwing colors on each other.........there is no greater fun for a kid. But Satguru didn't allow this practice and instead told his Sikhs along with his sons to participate in a Sikh event. Was this bad parenting on Satguru's part? Never, this was the best parenting in all of creation. There are other examples, but the one example presented delivers the message home very clearly.

Second NEW point: about other religious people come to celebrate with Sikhs in Sikh celebrations. Simple, that is there choice and if their religion tells them not to, then they should follow their religion. Sikhs don't make a person bow before Guru Sahib. If they don't want to bow and just want to sit and listen, then go right ahead. For Sikhs they can't participate in any type of idol worship. Whether you want to recognize it or not, you among others like Hazoor are willfully blind. You're ignoring the facts, which Gurbani lays out and then are intentionally not wanting to know what a Christmas tree at this time of the year represents.

Solutions to first new point: Instead of decorating a tree, get a small palki made which your kids can deocrate and then place shastar on this palki. Then sing Shastar Naammala and other Banis from Dasam Bani. Your kids will not feel left out and they will learn about Sikhi. Incoporate into this how the two older sons of Satguru Sri Guru Gobind Singh Sahib ji Maharaj used shastars to fight for what is righteous. This will paint a picture for your kids and they will develop a new yearning to learn how to use shastars.

[JSinghnz]

The main issue here is why Sikhs have to celebrate Christmas, put Christmas trees and exchange gifts when this has nothing to do with our religion.

Why don't we have the courage to tell our children that Christmas is not our festival?

Who other than parents can explain this to their children?

But who is going to teach the basics of Sikhi to the parents who just want to do in Rome what Romans do?

No one is stopping anyone to have a holiday with their near and dear ones but why do they have to ape the majority?

My young son told his teacher when she asked him to write a wish letter to santa claus that we do not celebrate Christmas.

We were so proud of him when he came back from school and told us this.

We never told him to say that to his teacher. It is what a child learns at home about his religion and identity.

PEOPLE WAKE UP FROM YOUR DEEP SLUMBER AND MAKE YOUR CHILDREN PROUD TO BE SIKHS

AND NOT SHEEP OF THE HERD.

[N30S1NGH]

I am not sure how having christmas tree denotes idol worshiping... I don't have christmas tree on premises a) i don't celebrate christmas as christmas tree is associated or have connotation with christian/catholic/paganism ideology b) Our Sikh dharam have quite bit of enrich history/memorable dates throught out the whole year i don't have time let alone desire to indulge - getting out of my way and getting a Christmas tree.

These premises above should be more than enough to have a discussion surrounding not having christmas tree, equating christmas tree as idol worship appears desperate move from the other side not to mention this thought itself seems cheap, blown out of proportion and clearly out of depth.

Few points to ponder regarding idol worship and christmas tree.

1. Johnny101 veer did good job filling in the blanks in the previous page, but with that being said

a) we are still comparing oranges(christmas tree)/pagan symbolism and apples(shiv morti) here..lets compare apples(jesus statue) and apples (shiv morti)

b) Even if we compare oranges with oranges (christmas tree vs hindu symbolism say- navaratee etc), it still does not associate with idol worship or constitute as idol worship. As clearly -having picture/idol/symbolism/iconography does not *automatically* constitutes as idol worship, what constitutes as idol worship is not the picture/idol/symbolism/iconography but rather one's perception surrounding these picture/idol/symbolism/icongraphy.. Whats the difference between idol and picture- clearly nothing..its same thing..what difference is your perception surrounding both..!!

2. I repeat again, as this is very important to people to understand- having pictures be it guru's pictures/shaheed singhs/sants/mahapursh pictures/inter faith cultural religious pictures/ancient indic pictures/idol such as - budda for example/laughling chinese budda/home decor stuff etc/artistic icongraphy does not automatically constitutes as idol worship, its the one's perception surrounding the above which decides if one is committing idol worshiping or not.

3. I tried my best with maharaj kirpa to discuss this whole hyper paranoia and knee j erk reaction mindset on the other thread regarding having committing idol worshipping with having guru's picture itself on forum, on top: http://www.sikhsangat.com/index.php?/topic/69491-picture/?p=562197 , take a look when you guys get a chance.

Picture be it artistic or real as sunsingh pointed out it's serve as reminder. It's huge generalization to suggest just because you have pictures of guru sahib, saints/soldiers in your house that indicates one is idol worshiping, its quite a insult and those who suggest that are clearly out of depth.

Idol worshiping have two forms- physical form and subtle form in one's mind. What we have done is we have condemned (rightly so) physical form of idol worshiping in sikhi- dhoof in front of picture and rightly so but sometimes so much so much that we have gone extreme lengths of removing fresco of our guru sahiban and destroyed our heritage in doing so in insecurity, paranoia.. now condemnation of physical idol worship is right but removing our heritage fresco/ discouraging artist expression references and destroying our heritage in insecurity that is totally wrong and quite frankly nothing but knee J E R K Reaction.

But what we also missed to address is subtle form of idol worshiping which is quite important one. You see idol worshiping have broader implications when in its subtle form its usually do with one's mind/perception than actual subject (picture). You could simply have no pictures in your house hold nor in your wallet but still be idol worshipper..how? Here is how, if your perception is stuck where we confine our guru sahib jot only in sargun saroop of sri guru granth sahib ji instead of hazar-nazar as well everywhere, inside everyone- your perception unintentionally is committing border line of idol worshiping..Jagadi Jot of all guru sahiban is in sri guru granth sahib ji there is no question about it nor they should be doubts or questions, but is guru sahib is confined to sargun saroop of sri guru granth sahib ji only?? No they clearly NOT......"confining" is the crux of argument here...We have iconic historical moment of sri guru nanak dev ji teaching lessons to Muslims of them confining their allah in the mecca..i thought we learned it from that historical event..i guess apparently *NOT* allah/Vahiguroo is everywhere lets not confine it. we are committing idol worshipping when confining vahiguroo who is sarab vyapak.!!!

Guru maharaj is sargun, nirgun(gyan) and shabad. When we think of guru sahib if we never bring all these aspects of guru sahib and "always" conditioned to be attached to one aspect of guru sahib we are committing idol worshiping as we are confining guru sahib.

So lets just honest with ourselves and look at "all" aspects of idol worshiping than just the physical one..!!

[Wingz23]

deck the halls with bells of holly foll a la la la la la

Tiz the season to be jolly foll la la la la la la

Sikh Sangat has gone crazy foll la la la la la

Lets see if we can get the post closed foll HA HA HA HAHA HA............................. HA! :giggle:

Happy Holidays :biggrin2:

[chatanga]

hyper paranoia

to me thats all this debate is.

[MrDoaba]

This much debate over a Christmas tree?! Jesus!! (pun intended)

In the last week with Maharaj's kirpa i got to spend a few days in the company of a true Brahmgiani. One Gursikh who we visited had a Christmas tree in his living room, they asked laughingly what it is and a sevadaar explained the story about St.Nicholas and how he did seva of giving presents to the poor children as well as how its linked to Jesus' birthday. They also said that its just something people do here. Brahmgiani Ji just nodded and said "teek a". :D

I'll should also mention it wasnt the only Gursikh household which had a tree.

People seriously need to chill out. Next you'll be saying Christmas trees are an RSS conspiracy.