Columnists

Whither Scholarship
The Talking Stick Colloquium # 52

Convenor: RAVINDER SINGH TANEJA

IMPORTANT - A NOTE FOR PARTICIPANTS:

Please be short and concise in your comments.

Please stay focused on the issues(s) being addressed in the discussion.

Please provide accurate translations in English for all quotations from gurbani.

Each gurbani quotation should be accompanied by page and line citation - e.g., [GGS:1215.6] - that is, Line 6 of page 1215 of the Guru Granth Sahib.

Please do not repeat points made in earlier comments.

Please avoid capitalizing words and passages, unless ABSOLUTELY necessary.

THE ROUNDTABLE

The previous colloquium around the Christian practice of Lectio Divina - which is not dissimilar to how devout Sikhs relate to gurbani - generated a very welcome and spirited discussion.

It got me thinking about different but related lines of thought, which I hereby share for your consideration.

There is, first, the matter of approach and method.

Gurbani itself instructs a Sikh to adopt a holistic model - that includes inquiry, thought, contemplation and discernment - for the study, understanding and experience of gurbani.

The following verse, which I nced upon and leave as already translated, attests to this fact:

har paṛ har likẖ har jap har gāo har bẖaojal pār uṯārī
Read, write, chant and sing and you shall be ferried across.

man bacẖan riḏai ḏẖiāe har hoe sanṯusat iv bẖaṇ har nām murārī ||1||
In thought, word and deed - meditate on the Name

man japīai har jagḏīs.
And with your mind, remain fixed in mediation

mil sangaṯ sāḏẖū mīṯ.
Seek the right company of a sadhu

saḏā anand hovai ḏin rāṯī har kīraṯ kar banvārī II Rahāo.
In this way, remain in the state of Anand (spiritual bliss)

har har karī ḏarisat ṯab bẖaio man uḏam har har nām japio gaṯ bẖaī hamārī.
Your glance stirs me to spiritual effort - thus I find emancipation

jan nānak kī paṯ rākẖ mere suāmī har āe pario hai saraṇ ṯumārī. ||2||3||9||
Nanak has placed himself at Your feet, please favor me.

Raag Vadhans [GGS:669]

The point to be noted in this verse - as well as many similar verses - is that despite emphasizing a rounded and comprehensive self-effort, the Guru unfailingly reminds us that ultimately it is nadar (Grace, not self effort) that will cure us of our affliction.

The difficulty with us is that we are much like the ambitious trainee who apprentices himself to an expert blacksmith, masters all the functions with alacrity and obtains a position in the royal forge - only to discover that he had forgotten to
learn how to light the fire.

Metaphorically speaking, we need to learn how to light the fire of naam to cure ourselves of the virus that afflicts us and fogs our vision - haumai.

I wondered why the Guru always trumps self-effort with nadar. Perhaps because a distinction is being made between empirical knowledge and mystical knowledge (bhram gyan) which must come from above.

This brings me to the subject of Sikh scholarship in general and Sikh Studies in particular as it relates to the diaspora.

This thought was triggered by a reader’s remark that Sikh scholarship is “sloppy,” and that many Sikh scholars (not all!) lack spiritual experience to be able to provide any real insight into gurbani.

Speaking of North America, where I live, there is a perceived gap (perhaps real in some ways) and a disconnect between Sikh scholars and their work and the concerns of the wider Sikh community. There is a feeling that the few scholars we have working in North American Universities are cut off (deliberately, perhaps) from the issues that interest or preoccupy the Sikh community.

In fairness to the scholars, we must concede that academic work is highly specialized, meant for consumption by experts in the field and not addressed to the llay public. What we lack, perhaps, is the public intellectual who can step outside the bounds of the narrow, specialized world of academia and be able to interpret and speak to a lay audience.

The public intellectual, though, is a rare phenomenon, and in the Sikh world, rarer still.

But there appears to be a divide even amongst scholars – between those who are deemed to be “traditionalists” and others who approach Sikhi from a strictly secular (phenomenological) perspective. Not surprisingly, the latter are to be found in the West.

Part of the difficulty stems from the very nature of gurmat and its expression in the Guru Granth Sahib. Although the Guru Granth contains the philosophic principles of gurmat, they are not readily discernable. The Gurus chose to deliver
their message in poetry and not as philosophy.

And this is the challenge for scholars and laypersons alike. The thought process that informs the Gurus' experience has to be “churned” into an intelligible Sikh theology.

The development and emergence of a Sikh theology can be seen in Sikh history right from the time of the Gurus to the 1920’s - from Bhai Gurdas’ expository works to the Nirmala and Udasi traditions to the intellectuals of the Singh Sabha movement like Bhai Vir Singh and Bhai Kahan Singh Nabha.

Viewed from a post-modern perspective, this collective heritage - important and valuable as it is - lacked the formality, rigor and methodology that academic disciplines require.

Although scholars like Bhai Jodh Singh, Principal Teja Singh, Bawa Harkishan Singh, Dr. Ganda Singh - and of course Sirdar Kapur Singh - brought the rigor and discipline of modern methodology to Sikh studies, much remains to be done and re-visited.

This is a challenge that today’s Sikh scholarship must take on.

LET'S CONSIDER
It is the genius of the Sikh Gurus to have created a unique scripture – the Guru Granth Sahib. At once a literary achievement of the highest order, a fount of sublime poetry and song, a repository of languages and an interfaith document, Gurbani is also and essentially Guru.

It offers a spectrum of experiences: to the devout and faithful, it offers succor and guidance; to the intellectual and scholar, it offers a rich source of inquiry.

Where does Sikh scholarship stand today - in terms of refining and enhancing Sikh theology? What role does Sikh theology play in shaping a distinctive Sikh ideology and Sikh identity? What challenges does Sikh scholarship face? Does a Sikh scholar require spiritual experience?

These are all questions for us to reflect on.

May 23, 2011

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