Sehajdhari website

tSingh · June 23, 2007

www.sehajdhari.co.uk

Not sure if this has been posted before. It should be interesting to watch what comes of this...particularly if they're doing research into it.

Mystical · June 23, 2007

Quite an informative site.

chatanga · June 23, 2007

informative ? theres very little info on it . 80 % of the SIkhs being sehajdhari seems a lot to me. I hiope it aint a website to provide excuses for sikhs who dont want to keep thier kes because they wanna follow the ways of the world.

As Bhagat Kabir warns us " following the ways of the world you lose your religion, but the world will not follow you in the end. the fool strikes his own foot with the axe in his own hand."

chatanga

kirpa_karo · June 23, 2007

fanatically sehajdhari

Xylitol · June 23, 2007

So it's essentially a website for sikhs without a Guru, who think they can still be sikhs as the guru envisioned.

See bhai Gurdass dian Vaaran where it most emphatically states more than once that without accepting the amrit baptism one remains without a Guru.

tSingh · June 24, 2007

Xylitol (great name by the way), do you seriously believe there was no way for a sehajdhari to get diksha and gurmantr after 1699? If so, based on what evidence?

Its a tricky one this. Its a bit like asking gyani if its alright to have an affair...they're not allowed to say otherwise no matter what they believe. There can be no compromise...and I understand why they have to do that.

Lets face it, the RSS, nor however many wahabi groups, nor a million jehovah's witnesses knocking on the door will ever diminish Sikhi (whatever that means) as much as modern latter stage capitalism. When every aspect of the human experience has been reduced down to market forces..even the identity construct, then its not surprising that a) taking on a visible religious identity is a bit like pushing against the world that the reaction against this modern context is extremism focused on external aspects of identity (the material elements).

So in this sense, for some, any concession to the idea of sehajdharis being accepted is loaded with implications for those who are moving away from Sikhi for other reasons. I mean how do you combat an inarticulate general change in the fabric of people's psyches (the punjab context)? You can't punch that one in the face...but you can punch dera sacha sauda or 'raavan raj' right?

But the reality is that prior to this modern post-colonial capitalist context, prior to the diaspora predicament of 'integration', there were sehajdharis and they cut their hair - not out of a sense of 'my god if I don't look like Bobby Deol (god forbid) I'll never get Kulvinder to marry me', but one of 'we choose not to take Khanda di amrit, but will take charan pahul initiation', etc. They were initiated into the panth. There were even very important schools of thought given the agya of Maharaj (Guru Gobind Singh Ji) who were sehajdhari. Some of those sehajdharis were there at the end of Maharaj's human existence, and were given the responsibility to maintain the historical shrines of the panth. In their propogation of Sikhi they had millions of people take nominal initiation into Sikhi as sehajdharis a far afield as Bangladesh right through to Afghanistan.

So its an impossible situation. Any concession is interpreted as a threat to the fragile appeal of the khalsa roop, no concession means continuing to alienate so many in seeming hypocracy to those who may later have become keshdhari (not that it particularly matters to me personally), and increases the appeal of groups like the radhaswamis.

shaheediyan · June 24, 2007

Some excellent points veer T Singh Ji, but do you have any idea's that may go towards solving this problem?

Although there is some truth in the Sehajdari arguement (as you have shown above), I doubt very much the owners of this website (or other similar movements I have known in the past) really understand the true concept of Sehajdari i.e. someone living the life of Sikh in every other way except not having taken Khande da Amrit - and therefore not commiting to be a knight of Guru Gobind Singh Ji.

Also, maybe difference between the use of the words Khulasa and Khalsa can shed some light here.

Does Khulasa equate to Sehajdari, or is it a term used to describe a group outside of Sehajdari and Amritdari?

chatanga · June 24, 2007

did charan pahul not end on vasiakhi. from what little i know Guru Ji first prepared charan pahul and then threw it into the sutlej, saying that the intitiation of sikhs thru charan pahul is over. in its place will be khande ki pahul.

chatanga

June 24, 2007

Even Narad Muni had to take gurmantar from Guru even though he was son of bhrama. Narad Muni asked bhrama, whats the need for me to take amrit because people call you God(creator of this world), bhrama replied- even you are son of khuda still you have to take amrit/gurmantar from Guru.

I am not denying sehajdhari do not exist/never exist, sehajdhari do exist but they are intiated(they took charan amrit/naam amrit) via either sehajdhari mahapursh or keshdhari mahpursh or almast mahapurshs in samparda's.

But I think site above has groosly misinterperated defination of sehajdhari sikh into any joe blow mona or sardar who go to gurdwara on sunday and rest of day- eat, drink and be merry.

ps: assumption on 80% percent of sikhs are sehajdhari seems tottaly far fetched to me.

kirpa_karo · June 24, 2007

sehajdhari - some1 who is living by what the guru says in all respects apart from taking khande di pahul

agree totally with the concept

chatanga · June 24, 2007

is khande ki pahul kind of like a bonus ? like if you observe all the other hukams of guru you can either "choose" to accept this bonus hukam or leave it. it dont make sense.

khande ki pahul is essential but that is not the message the website seems to be portraying. im getting the idea that as long as you believe in guru in the spiritual sense, it matters little whether you observe the physical sense.

as is written in suraj prakash" bani bana do pankh udave" - bani and bana are the two wings for the birds. ie they are complimenting each other in perfect balance. one without the other has no purpose.

that is the essence of sikhi - miri and piri in perfect balance. not for someone who is too weak to keep kes so he just makes up rubbish.

Xylitol · June 24, 2007

"sehajdhari - some1 who is living by what the guru says in all respects apart from taking khande di pahul "

I agree with the above concept of sehajdhari, and these are the sehajdhari's that research has shown were accepted as sehajdharis by amritdharees in purataan times.

in my above post, I was just referring to the joe blow types having a field day, trying to show that a watered down version of sikhi was allowed by the Guru.

Only through khande batte Amrit does one gain a puran Guru. There is only one puran Guru in the world today, according to Baba Gurbachan Singh ji, and that is Guru Granth Sahib ji.

Even those who had been blessed with Charan ki Amrit from the Gurus, and even the Bhagat sahiban who contributed Bani to Guru Granth Sahib ji, had to come back and accept Khande Batte da Amrit according to Gyani Takhur Singh ji. All to do satkaar of it and emphasise it's importance. Even the tenth Guru himself did.

Mystical · June 24, 2007

If a Sehajdhari takes Amrit doesnt that make him/her Amritdhari and no longer a Sehajdhari? Then whats the point of being called a Sehajdhari?

June 25, 2007

The real essence in intiation is gurmantar(naam) amrit, check out all the intiation in the eastern spiritual traditions, you will find naam amrit is common out of all, and core of all and essence of all, outer amrit varies/different ways of intiation ie- charan amrit, khanda amrit, amrit by holding hand of gurdev, amrit by gurdev putting hand on shish head. Bhagats in sri guru granth sahib got amrit by various ways by gurdev but common in those intiations was they got gurmantar. If Guru Sahib was against different ways of intiations(amrit) they wouldnt have included teachings of many bhagats(who got intiated different ways) in sri guru granth sahib ji.

Sidhant of sri guru granth sahib ji and gurmat - sidhant emphasize more on naam amrit, getting gurmantar from guru (both from socio-religious context- panj pyares/as well mystic context) than set type of intiations and rules. In fact there are no such rules/regulations of how intiation should be in Gurbani.

By taking all that into account, historically in the panth, charan amrit may be replaced by khanda da amrit in mainstream sikhi but in theory charan amrit still exist and its not lower than khanda da amrit because real essence of amrit in gurbani is decipher to- naam amrit which is common between all.

shaheediyan · June 25, 2007

Charan Amrit is a non-issue today, as there is no human Guru from whom to take charan amrit.

This is probably another reason why Khande da amrit replaced charan amrit, as human lineage had come to an end.

tSingh · June 25, 2007

Sevapanthis and Udasis gave both diksha and gurmantr to literally thousands upon thousands of people after 1699. I have read in one place that Udasis gave diksha with charan amrit, I have been told they even gave khanda di amrit. Looking at the Sevapanthis, they had parampras which were amritdhari, keshdhari and sehajdhari. They all did prachar and all had sizeable sangats. Guru Maharaj gave the agya for both groups to do prachaar. Guru Maharaj is said to have removed the tega from Bhai Kanhaiya's person. Plus there is the Hazoor Sahib kirpan bhet thing too.

Good question Shaheediyan, what is the solution? I have absolutely no idea. I recognise no difference with traditions among Udasis and Sevapanthis who are not amritdhari and I think they are a link to more enlightened times in the past (enlightened in a number of ways).

However, like I say the new context is very different. I sincerely believe that a major factor in all this is the total lack of meaningful modern sikh prachaar. I was on a train recently opposite a elderly sardarji and a hindu woman. They got chatting and the hindu woman spoke so beautifully about general spirituality, etc. The sardarji then piped up, and all he could do was tell 1001 historical stories about the Gurus not one with any deeper meaning explained. It was a real sad thing, but you see it all the time.

I sincerely believe that if the majority of people actually knew Gurmat sidhant in a way that was relevant to their experience, there would be less of that total greyness most videsi kids have about what Sikhi actually is. Its been said a million times, but I do believe this is rotting Sikhi into nothing from within. I don't believe the usual meaningless talks by beardos about the panj kakkars and Guru Maharaj asking for a head actually communicates very much about what Sikhi is. You need people who are willing to raise existential issues in an articulate and meaningful way. You need to inspire people that there is more to Sikhi without recourse to hyperventilating 'waheguru' or getting overly obsessed by the ideal visual image of a Singh and Singhni.

chatanga · June 25, 2007

The udasi's giving khande ki pahul ? do they say this themselves? the granthi of one of my local gurdwaras is related to an udasi and he said that he has never heard of any udasis claiming to give khande ki pahul.

i would advise all member on this forum to visit gurmatveechar and under Bhai Pinderpal Singh look up " Sikh, Singh te Pakhandi" i have listened to this recently and it touches on a lot of issues concerning sehajdharis.

also listen to Giani Thakur Singh and listen to " ardas khalse di" and there's a lot of stuff on the topic of sehajdhari.

chatanga · June 25, 2007

The udasi's giving khande ki pahul ? do they say this themselves? the granthi of one of my local gurdwaras is related to an udasi and he said that he has never heard of any udasis claiming to give khande ki pahul.

i would advise all member on this forum to visit gurmatveechar and under Giani Thakur Singh look up " Sikh, Singh te Pakhandi" i have listened to this recently and it touches on a lot of issues concerning sehajdharis.

also listen to Giani Thakur Singh and listen to " ardas khalse di" and there's a lot of stuff on the topic of sehajdhari.

tSingh · June 26, 2007

Admittedly, I'm not 100% on that one myself, but it is something I've heard. I shouldn't have posted it until I know better, sorry.

Admittedly, there are errors (or rather generalisations) in older texts. Sri Sant Rattan Mala explains that one sevapanthi became amritdhari from the hands of a Baba Bhag Singh who is then described to have been an Udasi. This is incorrect, he was a Nirmala...so these kind of errors exist too.

drawrof · June 26, 2007