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Maharani Jind Kaur plaque


puzzled
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5 hours ago, puzzled said:

Unless he had written the essay before his meeting but the British decided to publish it afterwards, to make it look like he died an atheist so Sikhs won't be inspired by him, it's the kind of thing the British would have done. 

 

Because he definitely has a joora in the last photo taken.Bhagat-Singh-in-Jail.jpg.f87533f3ad581cf8ff4a796f80e05bd6.jpg

 

That wasn't his last photo taken. It was taken years before his death (i.e before he cut his kesh)

 

https://i.pinimg.com/564x/b4/9d/de/b49dde75b85cbaf3f5ffc44735405980.jpg

 

 

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1 hour ago, Jai Tegang! said:

What you state is very important for us to understand. I think growing up we learn a sanitized and glossed version of our historical figures because that is what the audience can absorb. Majority of our  community simply didn’t have the depth (arguably still doesn’t) to see the multi dimensions of any personality. We want them boxed and presented as saints, warriors, or villains. That’s the depth previous illiterate, semi-literate generations had.

We had a simplistic worldview and limited political acumen and our top leadership is a prime example. Whereas Muslims could rally behind and appreciate non-practicing figures like Jinnah, and Nehru for Hindus, we stumble and limit ourselves. It doesn’t matter what these individuals were up to in their personal lives, what matters is what they could offer their respective communities. They were the top tier educated class of their time and could understand where the world was heading and where their communities would end up.

One of the posters in this thread criticized our eulogizing of figures like MRS and Jind Kaur. It’s valid that we don’t share the full story in Gurdwaras, but the reasons are obvious. The setting doesn’t allow for the vices of these figures to be shared, and for simple minds it would be difficult to reconcile the wretched lives of these figures with their impressive accomplishments.

Only now that a whole new generation of matured minds has emerged that can appreciate history with warts et al. We can look towards history and not loose faith when we encounter our normal narratives being challenged. Instead of abandoning it all, we can learn and decern what is needed for us now.

I think its a very Indian thing, everyone is either a hero or a villain. Just look at how one dimensional the characters in Indian movies and dramas are. While in Western literature and cinema its not the case. So we ended up doing the same with our historical figures. Some Sikh writers used make Ranjit Singh into some sort of saintly figure!

I think living in the west has allowed us to explore our history with an open mind, and not pigeonhole people into "good guy" and "bad guy"  and it has given these historical figures a lot character and personality, which I think is a good thing. 

 

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1 hour ago, Jai Tegang! said:

What you state is very important for us to understand. I think growing up we learn a sanitized and glossed version of our historical figures because that is what the audience can absorb. Majority of our  community simply didn’t have the depth (arguably still doesn’t) to see the multi dimensions of any personality. We want them boxed and presented as saints, warriors, or villains. That’s the depth previous illiterate, semi-literate generations had.

Brilliant post in general, but this above i think is very important. If we don't change this mentality we are in serious trouble. There's very little point in you or I understanding these points in isolation. This needs to be a widespread or mainstream mentality. 

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5 minutes ago, Jai Tegang! said:

The good news is our religious traditions and history don’t have same level of reconciliatory challenges others encounter. For example, Islam uses the sledgehammer approach to enforce, while Hindus take pride in being able to mould and adapt their beliefs, or completely reinvent ideologies to suit their political survival.

We have similar strains in our community to be fair. But I personally believe we can look our history in the eye and not worry about burning pages. If it makes one uncomfortable, it only reveals there’s a crucial human reality that you were missing out on.

I think one of the reasons for groupism and splintering that occurs in the ever so small practicing portion of our community is our inability to handle historical truths, or atleast grow our understanding, as more aspects of it come into clearer focus.

I think we sometimes heap unnecessary pressure on ourselves by trying to assume the role of one or the other religions as a template of behaviour or being. We shouldn't do this because to outsiders it seems as if we're insecure, when we shouldn't be, because we have our own set identity.

Our religious history is not a distant, ancient matter of myth that cannot be verified, but neither is it a modern-day, superficial cult-like outfit that lacks weight. There's some definite layered substance to it that is sometimes unwittingly pushed to the background when the straight-forwardness of certain factions takes centre stage. They tend to strip the overall philosophy of nuance in order to make the message digestible to the masses, which is understandable, but it also tends to alienate some of the more thoughtful onlookers who have a little more yearning for that substance. I think this is mostly due to the kind of place that India is and the kind of people it produces.

As for the "burning pages" aspect of it, I completely agree. I was mentioning this issue to somebody a few days ago. I feel that we can hold our heads high when we look back on the way our spiritual masters conducted themselves. But even this aspect of it is in the process of being undermined in terms of the Hindutva element gradually getting their paws dirty with slanderous propagandising that they've taken cues from evangelical western Christian efforts to seriously undermine and deconstruct Islam and its prophet. But whereas the Christians simply take what's admittedly unconcealed in Islamic scripture and unfurl it for exposure, the Indian approach seems to be a little more devious and calculating.

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57 minutes ago, MisterrSingh said:

I think we sometimes heap unnecessary pressure on ourselves by trying to assume the role of one or the other religions as a template of behaviour or being. We shouldn't do this because to outsiders it seems as if we're insecure, when we shouldn't be, because we have our own set identity.

Our religious history is not a distant, ancient matter of myth that cannot be verified, but neither is it a modern-day, superficial cult-like outfit that lacks weight. There's some definite layered substance to it that is sometimes unwittingly pushed to the background when the straight-forwardness of certain factions takes centre stage. They tend to strip the overall philosophy of nuance in order to make the message digestible to the masses, which is understandable, but it also tends to alienate some of the more thoughtful onlookers who have a little more yearning for that substance. I think this is mostly due to the kind of place that India is and the kind of people it produces.

As for the "burning pages" aspect of it, I completely agree. I was mentioning this issue to somebody a few days ago. I feel that we can hold our heads high when we look back on the way our spiritual masters conducted themselves. But even this aspect of it is in the process of being undermined in terms of the Hindutva element gradually getting their paws dirty with slanderous propagandising that they've taken cues from evangelical western Christian efforts to seriously undermine and deconstruct Islam and its prophet. But whereas the Christians simply take what's admittedly unconcealed in Islamic scripture and unfurl it for exposure, the Indian approach seems to be a little more devious and calculating.

It does make you wonder about the vision of our straight forward thinkers back in Punjab when they try to prune off every branch and stem of Sikhi, when in reality the masses are after the mystical spiritual escapes for their worldly troubles, for which, ironically, Sikhi presents a mix of spiritual and real world solution to. The Christians get it. They have revved up their game in this sphere; they’re offering miracles at your local pind church, which in some cases our short-sighted goodhearted fools have helped build, or at least refrained from objecting, not realizing this real-estate business is only going to grow and spread. Not hard to buy land and prop up a church or mosque if the locals aren’t objecting. There's no big requirement like langar, palki, and the whole works, just an empty square room will do. While hordes of poor sections of society head towards peers and the like for miracles, our guys are busy bringing down the spiritual authority of the Guru.

Coming to our Hindutva elder brothers, they’ve mastered their craft with previous trials and successes. There was a wonderful article on the Caravan news site that touches on this. It’s interesting to read how the founders of modern Hindutva like Sarvakar viewed us, and what drives their strategy for the Sikh Solution (it’s my own term btw, not in the article). https://caravanmagazine.in/religion/rss-threat-sikh-assertion-farmer-protests-savarkar-golwalkar

The strategy is multipronged. Two aspects I’ve picked up on: Repeat unsubstantiated fabricated stories that at the very least will create a lingering suspicion in impressionable minds ( they love doing this especially with Guru Teg Bahadur Ji, and Banda Singh Bahadur). Retell slightly tilted versions of our well understand history to create trust in our ranks while simultaneously steering the narrative.

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