SIKHISM.

BY FREDERIC PINCOTT, M.R.A.S.

THE task we have before us to-day is to examine the religion of the Sikhs; and it is an inquiry which will well repay the trouble, for many useful lessons may be deduced from it. It will teach us that some ideas apparently simple are in reality the result of ages of painful thought and investigation; it will teach us that individual reformers are only conspicuous links in a chain of progress which has gradually brought man to the level at which we find him; and, again, it will also teach us that the best intentions of the most earnest reformers may be rendered nugatory and even totally reversed by the enthusiasm and mistaken zeal of disciples and

successors.

In order to understand Sikhism it is necessary to have some knowledge of the religious ideas current in India before Sikhism appeared on the This will enable us to see that it was not a violent reform due to the stupendous abilities of one man, but that it was rather the natural outcome of previous ages of thought.

scene.

The earliest religious ideas of India which have descended to our time are those of pure Nature-worship-adoration of the sun, moon, wind, rain, clouds, dawn, etc., etc. In the course of centuries these primitive notions were worked up into a complicated system of religious belief, expressed in an elaborate ceremonial, with all the extravagance of Oriental pomp and wealth. It is needless to say that along with the upgrowth of such a ceremonial the heavens were peopled with a crowd of imaginary deities, whose favour had to be conciliated by constant offerings to the priests. At length the ceremonial and its associated ideas became too complicated and contradictory for even the priests themselves; and they felt the necessity for explaining, reconciling, and systematizing the chaotic mass of notions which had sprung up in wild luxuriance.

A period of philosophical speculation then began which is of the most interesting character; for, as many of the early books then composed have been preserved, we are able to trace the first operations of the human mind in evolving spiritual ideas from natural facts. To-day we can concern ourselves with only the ultimate result of these speculations; and this was that the entire universe and all its varied phenomena were held to be manifestations of one, eternal, unimpassioned Self, or Existence. The whole universe, therefore, contained only the eternal, all-pervading Self as the sole reality; hence it followed that there could be no second. All ideas of

duality were rank heresy, arising from delusion; and the highest knowledge was held to be the recognition of the absolute oneness of God and Nature. This was considered the end or object of all the sacred works, or Vedas, and therefore this system of philosophy ultimately came to be called Vedanta; that is, "the end of the Vedas." As soon as the individual soul recognised the Unity, it was supposed to lose all desire for the fickle delusions of sense; the bond which attached it to existence was thereby severed, and its round of transmigrations was brought to an end. By the attainment of true knowledge, therefore, the soul was set free or released from the bondage of existence, and thus obtained Deliverance.

The system of philosophy of which we are now speaking was evolved at a very early date, probably long before the invention of the name by which it is now known. It is found in the ancient creed of Persia, and it penetrated into Greece in times beyond historical record. Socrates, Plato, and Pythagoras were essentially Vedântists, even believing in the transmigration of souls. The Neo-Platonists were certainly tinged by the same doctrines; and these Pantheistic ideas may have penetrated much further. The evolution of this system of philosophy brought with it a great reform in India. The demonstration of the unity of God swept away the necessity for the crowd of subordinate deities; and as the highest knowledge and final deliverance were to be attained only by the recognition of this unity, it followed that the ceremonial observances of the Brahmans were purposeless labours. This was perceived by the great reformer known as Buddha, and he therefore boldly proclaimed all men equal, since all were equally illusory; and he taught that a life of virtue and benevolence, and a heart freed from all desire, would secure deliverance from the miseries of transmigration. This simple creed of Buddha spread with rapidity, and remained the dominant creed in India for about a thousand years, until, in its turn, becoming mystical and corrupt, it passed into a degraded form of the old Brahmanical faith which it had formerly superseded. This revival of Brahmanism, or, as it is now called, Hinduism, took place in the ninth century of our era, under the leadership of the famous reformer S'ankarâchârya.

We are now approaching the main subject of our lecture. The Panjab being the earliest home of the Hindûs in India, was probably the seat of the most developed forms of Hindû religious thought; and the Panjab being, furthermore, the connecting link between Persia on the one hand and Central Asia on the other, was unavoidably affected by the ideas of those who passed to and fro for commercial, political, and warlike objects. It will be remembered that it was through the Panjab that Alexander, and all other conquerors penetrated into India; and through the Panjâb also a stream of Greek emissaries passed to and fro for hundreds of years. We know that the religion of the Vedas took its rise in the Panjâb, and that in the Panjâb Buddhism afterwards held undisputed sway. The deep impression which Buddhism made on the people of the Panjâb is attested by

the direct evidence of ancient writers, and by the enormous number of Buddhistic remains continually being dug up there.

When the revival of Hindûism took place in Central India in the ninth century, Buddhism was still a power in the Panjâb, although it had become corrupt, and was ready for a change. The change came, however, from the reverse side, for in the year 1001 Mahmûd of Ghazni broke into the Panjâb through Afghanistan, and, after ravaging the country for twenty or thirty years, ultimately established a governor in Lahore, the capital of the country; and from that day forward the Panjâb was cut off from the rest of India, and became a Muhammadan State.

It happened, however, that the Muhammadans who conquered the Panjâb were of Persian origin; and they brought with them the form of Muhammadanism which was largely mixed with the notions of the Sufis, which were practically the same as those of the Vedântists, or ancient Indian philosophers. It must not be supposed that this called forth any sympathy between the conquerors and the conquered. The Muhammadans were far too bigoted to listen to, much less to examine, the religious ideas of their Indian subjects. The only result of the presence of the Muhammadans in the Panjâb was to partly Muhammadanize the district, and to partly cut it off from the religious movements of the rest of India.

The religious mind of India began to be exceedingly busy at this time. Sankaracharya, as I have already stated, overturned Buddhism in the ninth century by preaching belief in a personal god, whom he named S'iva, or Happiness; and he armed him with a trident, the emblem of Buddhism, as though to indicate that by the very law of Buddha he would overturn Buddhism. His was a church militant; but in the eleventh century Râmanuja arose, who preached a milder creed, taking Vishnu as his deity, Vishnu meaning "the pervader," the one who fills all space. > The religion of Râmanuja was little else than a re-organization of Buddhism on a Hindû basis.

While these sectarial struggles were going on among the Hindûs in the plains of India, the Muhammadans were consolidating their power in the Panjab, and were pushing their conquests still further into the country. Many desperate fights ensued; and the patriotic feelings of the country being called forth, a species of hero-worship sprang up, which was brought to a focus by Râmânand, about the year 1350, who preached the godship of heroism under the name of an ancient leader, Râma. Krishna, a warlike king of Mathurâ, also received divine honours about the same time; and to the present hour Râma and Krishna are the two great deified names which cheer the lives and console the dying moments of orthodox Hindûs. Notwithstanding the Muhammadan domination, these waves of Hindu thought found their way into the Panjâb, and helped to adulterate and confuse the lingering Buddhism, the reviving Hinduism, and the advancing Muhammadanism. The proof that the Panjâb participated in the mental struggle is found in the appearance of Gorakhnath and his sect in the

thirteenth century. That still famous teacher and learned enthusiast was a Yogin, the sect of Hindus most in harmony with Buddhistic feeling; and his object seems to have been to reconcile decaying Buddhism with reviving Hinduism.

A few more years, however, were sufficient to prove that the fierce hatred of idolatry everywhere shown by the Muhammadans was beginning to tell on the Indian mind. In the year 1450 the large-hearted Kabir flourished. He was a worshipper of Râma, the hero-god; but he taught a spiritual form of adoration, which should engage the heart and mind and faculties, and not the mere body and purse. He attacked the worship of idols with all the energy of a Muhammadan, but he also assailed the authority of the Quran and the Hindu sacred works alike. He scorned the exclusive use of a learned language for the conveyance of religious truth, and composed his own works in the dialect of his humble fellowcountrymen. It will be seen from this that Kabir was a reformer of the most pronounced type. He broke with the present and the past, rejecting all formality and dogmatism, teaching the penitent and contrite heart to look up to God direct and to rest upon His all-sufficing goodness and mercy. But the most remarkable feature in Kabir's teaching was the fact that he did not confine his influence to his Hindu co-religionists; he addressed Muhammadans also, and was anxious to form a God-loving community on a basis common to both Hindû and Muhammadan.

Almost contemporaneous with Kabir there arose in the Panjâb the great and good man with whose teaching we are to-day immediately concerned. In 1469 the revered Nânak was born, near the town of Lahore; and he came into the world inheriting the traditions which I have endeavoured to sketch, while the struggle between Hindû and Muhammadan thought and power was raging. The previous unsettlement in the minds of men had prepared the way for a devout and enthusiastic teacher to build up a new and living faith. Nânak was just the man for such a task; for he was thorough and consistent, prudent and yet enthusiastic, inoffensive yet urgent, and as gentle in manner as he was strong in faith. Nânak was one of the great reformers of the world; for he clearly perceived the errors of his predecessors, and had the boldness to proclaim the truth, even against the opposition of the prejudiced and the interested, whether exalted or humble.

Nânak's principles may be reduced to a single formula-the Unity of God and the Brotherhood of Man. For Nânak there was no such thing as a god for the Hindus, a god for the Muhammadans, and a god or gods for the outer heathen; for him there was but one God; not in the likeness of man, like Râma; not a creature of attributes and passions, like the Allah of Muhammad; but one, sole, indivisible, self-existent, incomprehensible, timeless, all-pervading,-to be named, but otherwise indescribable, adorable and altogether lovely. Such was Nânak's idea of the Creator and Sustainer of the phenomenal world; and it was a conception which at once

abrogated all petty distinctions of creed, and sect, and dogma, and ceremony. The realization of such a God shatters the sophistries of the theologian and the quibblings of the dialectician; it clears the brow from the gloom of abstruse pondering over trifles, and leaves the heart free for the exercise of human sympathies. And if the grand idea of the Incomprehensible Unity, which could be only named and adored, levelled all distinctions of creed and caste, so did the great truth of the Brotherhood of Man sweep away the barriers of nation, tribe, and station. Nanak taught that all men are equal before God; that there is no high, no low, no dark, no fair, no privileged, no outcaste; all are equal both in race and in creed, in political rights and in religious aspirations.

These two ideas—the Unity of God and the Brotherhood of Man-while uniting all classes on a common basis, at the same time separated those who accepted them from the rest of their countrymen as an association of God-fearing republicans; for what Nânak claimed was Liberty from prescribed trammels, Equality before God, and the Fraternity of mankind. The practical application of the doctrines thus taught led to the formation of a new nationality, the disciples of the great teacher becoming a republican fraternity, which gradually consolidated into a separate nation by the necessity for struggling for the liberty they claimed.

Having thus touched on the distinguishing feature of Nânak's creed, but little need be said of minor details. As might be expected from the historical sketch I have just given, the subordinate features of Nânak's faith were a mixture of Muhammadan, Buddhistic, and Hindû ideas. Like the Muhammadans, Nânak taught that the great Name of God was an efficacious instrument of saving grace; like the Buddhists, he held that the attainment of Nirvana, or eternal, passionless repose, was the highest and final reward of virtue; like the Sûfîs, he believed that each soul was an immortal ray of light from the Supreme; and like the Hindus, he thought that the quintessence of all doctrine rested in a realization of the formula “Sō hăm” ("I am that"). This last expression, it will be seen, is the pure Vedanta doctrine that God is Nature, and that the individual soul is only a portion of the Universal Soul, in accidental union with cosmical phenomena. As soon as the individual soul realizes the idea that it and that are one-in other words, that it is only a minute atom of that eternal, all-pervading Self-then, by that very recognition, individuality is at once destroyed, and with it all the desires and passions which chain the soul to worldly life.

The essential doctrine of the Unity is impressed on the mind of every Sikh by the figure 1 being prefixed to every book, section, and chapter of every volume, and at the beginning of every document and letter. This pantheistic resolution of all that exists into one Unity, agrees with the Vedanta doctrine, and also with Persian Sûff-ism. Jâmi, the Persian poet, in his passionate verses on Joseph and Potiphar's wife, exclaims :

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