Hi everyone.
I just joined this website/forum, and this is my first post. I guess you could say that I joined because, like the topic of my post states, I am confused - specifically, about (many things about) Sikhism. I was born into this religion. I grew up going to the temple, a lot (as a kid). My grandfather prayed a lot - every evening, and we always joined him. As kids, we just would listen to it, and he taught us to recite a lot of the prayers at first just to learn them, and we did. However, I never knew the meaning behind the words. So from a young age, we were taught how to pray (as Sikhs), and taught what the general rules were in Sikhism. I was sent to Punjabi school and am fluent in it, as well as being able to read and write it. Like many Sikhs with a Punjabi identity, I also struggled with something else: being born and raised in the western world, which meant growing up identifying myself with that cultural identity, with the added confusion of having to "act like a Punjabi" (which is a very strong culture with a lot of traditions/expectations to adhere to) because my family is Punjabi. My parents are very 'westernized' as they were also raised in the west from a young age, but always felt very strongly that we follow Punjabi cultural rules, and just respect our elders and their traditions, as well as Sikhism, as much as we are able to. As we got a little older, my grandfather would sometimes sit down with us and explain for a couple of hours at a time - lines from the Guru Granth Sahib - giving us the direct quote/line - and then he would tell us what it meant (in modern Punjabi) so we'd get the real meaning/essence of the teachings.
I lived with most of my extended family growing up, so I had a lot of interaction with my grandparents. It was my grandfather who explained to me as much as he could about Sikhism, and that is really the only guidance I had in terms of Sikhism and what the religion actually teaches, and is all about. My mother and father worked a lot while my grandparents raised us and never really had the time to sit with us and talk about God. I am much older now (in my later 20s) and my mother talks to me about spiritual matters and my father really doesn't that much. My grandfather passed away last year. I don't have anyone to discuss these things with anymore. Even when we went to the gurdwara as kids, it was my grandfather who was so active in the Sikh community and in our upbringing and trying to teach us about the religion (and culture) - that made that experience meaningful in any capacity at all. In general - this is what I saw growing up in how Sikh Punjabi families in my community went about going to the gurdwara: The parents/grandparents/elders would bring their children with them to some kind of function at the temple. The kids would sit with their parents, eyes wandering, daydreaming, as the Guru Granth Sahib was read in the background - in words foreign to even the Punjabi-speaking children. It was like this invisible boundary was always there, stopping hordes of kids from understanding what was being said - (that barrier being language I guess). When the kids would get agitated enough, or bored enough, or restless enough, they'd run off with their friends into the langar hall or to explore the hidden corners of the gurdwara, often an old industrial building, and play - while their mothers and aunts and grandmothers would often listen to prayers or work and talk/gossip in the kitchen/langar hall - and the men would do the same, in their own way (i.e. do their own thing). Maybe I shouldn't extend my own experience as what others experienced, but many I grew up with I know shared my experience - in that yes, they went to the gurdwara, but it was more something that they had to do, because it's just what Sikhs do, and no real spiritual/religious meaning was derived from it.
It's kind of like - I have an aunt in my family who considers herself very religious. She was never baptized as a Sikh (actually, no one in my family is apart from my grandfather and grandmother on my mother's side, but I did not grow up in the same country as them and have a distant relationship with them). This aunt is very materialistic, showy, a pretty nice person when she wants to be, but a very proud person. She has an akhand path every year, but it's like she just 'goes through the motions'. I've found this pattern in a lot of Sikh Punjabi homes/families that are living in the western world - they do these "Sikh" religious prayers/rituals (I say ritual just referring to the way Sikhs have set up organized ways to pray i.e. 3 day prayer = akhand path, and all the cultural/religious rituals that go along with it). I guess it feels more like when you go to these things, it feels more like an excuse for a bunch of people in the community to get together, or someone to just bless their house - when no one is really getting to the real MEANING of it. It's like the women just sit in the kitchen and clean up and that takes up all three days, and the men are busy doing what the women are telling them to do - and often, the room in which the prayer is being done, apart from the last day (the bhog) - is often found empty, being attended to by one person while prayers are being read - and that person is just there as if it's shift duty.
Obviously, these experiences are my own and cannot be exactly what everyone else growing up around me felt like. I am just terribly confused I guess, spiritually and otherwise. If I go to the gurdwara, there is no "clergy" to speak to - who has answers for my spiritual and religious questions. Maybe it's because I grew up in the west (and therefore exposed to western religions) that I think religion has to prescribe to us a way of life. I also admit, even though I know the basic rules of Sikhism - I do not follow some of them. I have never taken a drug or touched alcohol in my entire life, but I have cut my hair, and I am not baptized into Sikhism (have not taken amrit). I eat meat. So maybe, one could argue, I haven't even tried hard enough to really even "get" Sikhism. The thing is, I have read translated parts of the Guru Granth Sahib, and I still struggle at times with that - because some of it is very metaphorical, and almost poetry-like - instead of directly telling you the meaning of something, or saying outright "here is how to life your life."
What confuses me even further is that the Punjabi culture is DIRECTLY at odds and in opposition to some very fundamental teachings unique to Sikhism. I don't know much but I do know for example - the first few lines of the Guru Granth Sahib - about how God is One, and there is only One God, and all human beings are equal under this One God. All human beings are created equal - man and woman, regardless of race, caste, culture, creed, or religion. "There is no Hindu, there is no Muslim" - to me, means that all religions are to be respected, and revered, in their own way, or at the very least - tolerated - and the freedom for each human being to revere God in his/her own way must be respected and we must not interfere with this. I was always taught in my family that this means that Sikhs don't make it a mission to go out and convert others to their religion - in other words, we believe in "live and let live." There is not really a notion (as I understand it) that in Sikhism - if you are not part of this religion, then you are doomed to some sort of hell - it seems to me more of an acknowledgement that all religions are to be respected, and it is a Sikh's duty to fight for this freedom and human right equally if it's for our own religion, or to stand up for the rights of a person of another religion.
I know this is a very long post and I may be dragging on here. I just think I have grown very confused and frustrated with not being able to explain how I feel to anyone. I grew up being taught these beliefs, but the truth is (and I know this is the truth for many Punjabis) - that being Punjabi, and having that cultural identity often overshadows being Sikh, in a big way - so big often that our lifestyle becomes hypocritical. For example - my religion teaches me that I am equal to a man, but my Punjabi culture is patriarchal and culturally - (and reinforced in my real, day-to-day life by every family get together and event, family structure, the way our families work, and who is in charge) - teaches me that I am inferior in many ways as a woman. As a woman in my culture, even in the western world, born and raised here, my brother and the brothers of all my Punjabi female friends were given a lot more freedom. In this culture, if a boy has relationships before marriage, it's seen as "boys will be boys" and more accepted, but for a female the consequences are much, much more severe. She is often ostracized, and made to feel even more inferior, and is often shamed. The female in Punjabi culture is taught to be subservient and almost groomed to be a certain way - especially with the goal of marriage as the ultimate goal/end-point. Punjabi men are often big drinkers - and this is the cultural norm, just as it is the cultural norm that a Punjabi woman would never be seen drinking in public, because for her culturally it is forbidden and she'd have to suffer the consequences to her reputation, etc. I am saying all of this as someone born and raised in the western world even - which means that even growing up in one of the most if not most 'modern' and free places for women in the world, my Punjabi culture takes precedence and has a very real presence in my life as a woman, regardless of the laws and freedoms and rights (for women) of the country I live in. You hear of honour killings for Punjabi women all the time, often at the hands of Punjabi men in their own families - uncles, fathers, brothers, or grandfathers - but you will never hear of an honour killing for a man (i.e. a man shamed the family). I wouldn't want this - I think it is horrendous either way. I am merely making a point to point out how far these 'cultural rules' go and the extremes to which they are taken, and the control it has over some people's lives. Even in the western world, where Sikh girls are pushed to be educated and independent, it's in most cases so that she can have the modern qualifications of being "fit to marry" and to keep up with the status quo. Sikhism doesn't condone any of this, yet I see this happening in Sikh Punjabi families - and sadly, these archaic cultural beliefs are just accepted as the norm and even protected - as the cultural norm (or cultural extremes) - and protected in a way and reinforced - even if it directly contradicts the Guru Granth Sahib, and God.
Punjabi culture believes in the caste system, and anyone who believes it doesn't even in modern day (at large) I would say is naïve, or (innocently) idealistic. As a kid, I asked my father and my grandfather a few times, on different occasions - why, as a "Jatt" (a caste in Sikhism) that my family belongs to - we cannot marry other castes, even if they are Sikhs? Even as a very young child, this was glaring hypocrisy to me, and I never quite knew what I should be loyal to - my religion, or my culture? I was just told "that's the way it is" (obviously, here, culture won the argument in what dictates that rule in our family). If I married outside of my caste, it wouldn't be accepted. Marrying outside of my religion would lead to me being disowned - but then again, I don't know if the Guru Granth Sahib explicitly states that this is not allowed, since it says in its very first lines - that all human beings are equal under One God and there is "no Hindu, there is no Muslim". The gurus died defending these beliefs - and so did their children and family members and friends. Human beings - actually lost their lives - defending these beliefs - and it really confuses me why as Sikhs (with a Punjabi identity) - our traditions as Punjabis directly is at odds with teachings in Sikhism - and furthermore, are followed and revered in some respects as higher than the religion. I guess it's based on shame - i.e. "what will people think?" if my daughter married outside of her caste, or married a "black man" or a "white man" (even if he was a Sikh). In a nutshell, what this has resulted in (according to me and my observational skills and human life experience) - is an entire generation (i.e. my generation and the ones younger than it who share the same religious/cultural identity combo) that carries a religious and spiritual void - and has grown up in the west falsely correlating Punjabi culture with Sikhism - but in reality only following a set of prescribed cultural traditions. I have grown up with a lot of female sisters and cousins - highly educated wonderful women - insightful and with unique personalities - that had the same questions as me growing up. What's sad is that I've witnessed so many of them grow up (older than me, or younger than me) and just give up asking or trying to find answers, or questioning things out loud and having open discussions about it. It seems culture always wins out in the end (in a lot of cases) where as women they feel they have no voice anyways, and it's better to just not disrupt the family and just do what they are told even if it makes no sense, and even if it's against their own religion. When they get to this point, they've almost become a shell of their former selves, answering my questions in the same robotic way my elders answered me when I was a kid, "that's just the way it is".
Maybe this is just how it is in every religion - when it comes to cultural rules dictating areas of our life selectively and religion governing others. My main concern is this - when I feel this confused at times - where do I go for answers? My gut instinct tells me the answer is the Guru Granth Sahib itself - because after all, that is said to be the last guru and it IS the Sikh teachings. When I have even inquired about specific passages within the Guru Granth - even then, interpretations from different people make the meaning completely different and sometimes I feel an individual's own agenda has an effect on what they WANT a certain passage to mean. It's just hard - if I for example did something according to the Guru Granth Sahib that was in conflict with Punjabi tradition - I would be shunned in my family - and I know that's the reality for a lot of other Punjabi (male and female) individuals. I am sure that living in the west with immigrant grandparents, and their children (my parents' generation) - also makes things a little more difficult -as immigrants are always scared of losing their identity and in the hope of holding on to it and in fear of losing it they adhere to it even more crazily than those in the 'homeland' would (because those in the 'homeland' don't face the same fear of losing their cultural/religious identity over generations).
For anyone that read this complete post, thanks. I am interested in anyone's feedback and comments. Do you feel the same as I do? Do you ever feel confused as a Sikh? Do you even feel at times that you don't know if you are a Sikh, if you are not baptized (take amrit)? I would be really interested in knowing if anyone has any input or personal experience with what to do when you felt this way - where did you go for guidance and clarification? What helped you to understand Sikhism better? Personally, I know I value religion much, much more than my cultural roots - to me, cultural roots are just traditions that are passed down from generation to generation and I was raised in a country where I was surrounded by every religion and every culture - and every religion always seemed to agree on the major fundamentals - i.e. being a good person and doing the right things, and having morals, and ethics - but cultures all have their own ideas of everything. To me, that is why culture is of little significance - but I know a lot of Punjabis struggle with what I am feeling. I also struggle to get meaning out of my life spiritually and I don't know how to access that or get to it - or to learn, because like I said, in the gurdwara there is no organized clergy there for those questions and discussions like priests in church. Have any of you been confused when you've been raised with certain religious beliefs and then in your daily home life, as a Punjabi, seen this directly contradicted time and time again and wondered why?
I'm looking forward to reading any comments/questions/feedback - maybe it will help me in how to learn more about Sikhism the right way - or in the very least, help me to feel not so alone and lost. Take care everyone, and thanks for reading.
