Hinduvata extremists love to see Yogi Bhajans SikhNet tantric / kundalini yoga followers practicing yoga because it fits into their Hinduvata plan of subsuming Sikhi into Hinduism! Here is a quotation from a Hindu Swamis history of yoga: swamij/history-yoga.htm In 1969, Yogi Bhajan caused an uproar among the traditional Sikh community (an offshoot of Hinduism) when he broke with tradition and began to teach Kundalini Yoga to his Western students. Today his Healthy, Happy, Holy Organization—better known as 3HO—has more than 200 centers around the world. swamij/history-yoga.htm Sikh Gurdwara in Yuba City rejects Yogi Bhajan tantric yoga SikhNet youth camp for Sikhs! https://youtube/watch?v=jBDZHNQurD0 Sikhs demand Gurmukh Kaur CANCEL Hindu fire puja at Hollywood kundalini yoga studio! https://youtube/watch?v=dGPVRbahulw This article on Sikhchic makes clear why Sikhs are so upset by Gurmukh Kaurs performing a Hindu fire puja & hosting a Hindu Swami in her Hollywood yoga studio parking lot this Saturday August 16th. Sikhs can do something this Saturday in Hollywood California to show the world that Sikhs are NOT Hindus by protesting against the Yogi Bhajan cult which is trying to subsume Sikhi into Hinduism! https://facebook/events/1510340532534170/ sikhchic/columnists/hum_hind ... not_hindus Hum Hindu Naheen Hain! We Are Not Hindus! I.J. SINGH The following is being re-published from our archives. The issue it addresses has recently come to the forefront with India now in the stranglehold of a rabid, fundamentalist brand of extremist Hindus who are hell-bent on dragging the country back into the Middle Ages. The Internet is abuzz these days and Sikhs worldwide are seriously upset. A luminary of the right wing Hindu movement in India has written an article. At any time, many articles get published that carry significant errors of both omission and commission but this has both, and is also indecorous in the extreme. It weaves its inaccuracies in a pattern that is meant to challenge and goad Sikhs to respond in kind - preferably not in a sensible, considered and mature fashion. Of course, it has the Sikhs boiling mad. But a considered response still waits. The author, Tewari, wrote it after a visit to The Golden Temple at Amritsar. I have seen parts of his essay, and it consists of nothing more than a series of impolite and unwelcome diatribe and demands. He tells us that many names of the Hindu pantheon occur in the Guru Granth ... and they do. The count runs to several thousand - hence, he claims that Guru Granth is nothing more than a derivation of the Vedas and restatement of the Hindu religion. He, then, goes on to rename the premier Sikh place of worship, the Harmandar Sahib (Golden Temple) at Amritsar as a shivalya - a Hindu temple that is dedicated to the Hindu god Shiva. He clearly does not know that the Guru Granth, in addition to the writings of the Gurus, has those in it compositions of many saints and bards who would not ever sit and break bread together, much less be caught on the adjoining pages of the same holy book in hindudom - as they are seen in the Guru Granth. You see, some of these saints were so-called low-caste Hindus and others were Muslim. In traditional Hindu belief, neither has an acceptable place or right to pursue a religious calling or read the scriptures. I add here that neitrher do Hindu women. He goes on to demand that Sikhs purge the Guru Granth of these unacceptable writings, especially those by Muslims. He also wants the Sikhs to change the menu of the Sikh community meal (langar) that is a most attractive part of every Sikh service around the globe. (Sikhs cook with onions and garlic which are anathema to the traditionally prepared Hindu religious meal.) His is a virtual mishmash of fulminations and demands covering the gamut from our fundamental beliefs to our widespread practices. I am not even going to classify them into what is trivial and what is nonsense. To my mind that would be an inappropriate and mindless exercise. Such inferences as he has advanced need to be immediately relegated to the nearest trash bin. Why? For answer to that lets take a longer look at some historical nuggets. Tewaris issues are posited not for serious dialog; they are raised to get our goat. We need not - indeed must not - fall into the trap. It would not be productive. In the last century, Swami Dayanand, a Hindu religious reformist, wrote his magnum opus, Satyarth Prakash that has become the Bible of the Hindu right wing that wants to reinvent the rich multifaith Indian culture as Hindutva - a new society based on the Hindu religion and culture. Satyarth Prakash also has passages attacking the integrity, character and teachings of the major non-Hindu prophets of other religions - including Jesus, Mohammed and Guru Nanak. The book continues to enjoy widely distributed reruns amongst the right wing Hindus. Despite all attempts to inform the publishers, the insulting passages against other religions remain. In fact such attempts to deny Sikhs an independent place in the sun are even older - they are largely, if not entirely, the initiatives of Hindu thinkers and writers since the times of the Gurus. I find it intriguing that there has been a serious attempt in history that continues to this day by the larger Hindu society around us in India to claim Sikhi as an off shoot of Hinduism. This tells me that there must be much in Sikh teaching that Hindus admire so much that they wish to own it without giving up the label of Hindu. I remind you that no one seeks identity and commonality with someone that is not admired. Seriously, I am flattered by this except that I wish to reject the stultifying embrace - a boa constrictors love it would be - simply because it infringes on my right to define myself as I wish to - with warts and all. I know well that at the periphery of any religion, where a movement comes into contact and overlaps with the religions of its neighbors, mixed practices arise. Nevertheless, such admixture does not mean that the two intertwined traditions are not separate and independent identities. If one wants to catalogue the ways that cultural practices of Hindus and Sikhs overlap, Harjot Oberois Destructuring Religious Boundaries would be a good read. But attempts to push such a mixture as proof of commonality of religious doctrine have existed from the times of the Gurus half a millennium ago. People fail to see that the Gurus taught largely in the languages and cultures of India. The context of time and culture cannot be ignored. Hence, the metaphorical references to Hindu mythology and practices. After all most converts came from the caste-ridden Hindu society. Our critics fail to see that there are copious references to both the Hindu and Muslim pantheon in the Guru Granth. Ram, for example occurs reverently as the name of God a myriad times; but the historical Ram, too, is mentioned and then he is summarily dismissed. In Hindu belief and practice, there is no distinction between the two Rams and the two are entirely conflated. Our Hindu critics also fail to see that Islamic names of God - Allah, Rahim, etc, too, occur repeatedly. Had there been easy access to Judeo-Christian literature, I am sure some would have reference, a place or commentary in the Guru Granth. The Hindu way of life rests on the centrality of the Brahmin, Caste system, the Codification of Hindu practice by Manu, and the place of the Mother Cow as the great nurturer. These fundamentals lie rejected by the Founders of Sikhism. As an aside, clearly, the Old Testament is at the root of Christianity and Islam. But to now on this basis to deny the independent existence of either or to label Christians and Muslims as Jews (Reformed?) would be asinine, at best. They have recognizable ties to Judaism that are rooted in history, tradition and teaching, but they are now independent realities. Similarly, all Indic religions have overlapping practices. It is the denial of their independence and growth that is galling. Hindu thought has always been unaccepting of the growth of such independent movements. Witness the fact that Buddhism that originated in India now has only a marginal existence in the land of its birth, even though it enjoys a growing popularity and acceptance outside India. It was decimated in India by the muscular anti-Buddhist policies of Hindu zealots. India became independent only in 1947. For the first time in almost a millennium, the majority religion - Hinduism - was able to flex its muscle. Look at its first act: In the Constitution of the new nation, Sikhs, Buddhists and Jains are lumped together for legal purposes under the rubric of Hindus. Perhaps it saves a few drops of ink and a few lines of print, but their independent existence is denied even on paper. The history of the struggle for Punjabi speaking linguistic state is a fascinating chapter in the Sikh struggle for an equal place at the table in India. I see the events of 1984 as a logical but tragic chapter in the same saga. Sikhi is now and has been from its inception under siege. As long as Sikhs keep their independent identity and treasure the unique message of Guru Granth, they will thrive. Circling the wagons - as a clarion call - will not do. We need to be both clearheaded and resolute; just one attribute of the two will not be sufficient. Yet, Sikhism teaches us to accept and respect the separate identity of the Hindu way of life, and similarly respect the vision of other faiths. It is the same acceptance that we expect in return - no more and no less. We all have the right to write comparative papers on our religion and the religion of our neighbors. But to deny them their independence is a funny way to win friends. But the Hindu view has been consistently negative. In the early 20th century, the renowned Sikh scholar, Bhai Kahn Singh (Nabha), had to respond with a booklet titled Hum Hindu Nahin (We Are Not Hindus). It is not our business to tell Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Buddhists or Jews, etc. how to define the requirements of their respective faiths. Why, then, should a Hindu want to tell us how to reshape ours? And this is not the first time that some Hindu has stuck his nose where it does not belong. Between Dayanand and now Tewari, and even before these two, there were many, many more who tried to finish and destroy the Sikhs as an independent people - from Nadir Shah and Ahmad Shah Abdali, Jehangir, Aurungzeb to the petty Hindu Hill Rajas in the eighteenth century and Indira Gandhi in the twentieth. Some even thought they had achieved their goal and there were no more Sikhs. Yet here we are today. And I assure you, my readers, that the pattern and attacks will continue - so stay cool, and act but in sehaj, laced with a dollop of humour. To the deniers of a place to Sikhs and Sikhi, I would say: Remember - your freedom of expression ends where my nose begins! First published on February 2, 2010; re-published on August 2014
Posted on: Wed, 15 Oct 2014 16:58:43 +0000
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