Quoting From Rehitnamas

[Guest]

I don't know if its concerning to others or my imagination going wild.

I see alarming rate of youths quoting from rehitnamas, janam sakhiya right left and center (whether it be bhai nand lal, bhai chaupa singh , bhai dya singh, bhai mani singh janamsakhis, sau sakhiyas) to prove their point across on various topics on various forums. I have a question regarding that to people who are quoting rehitnamas, janamsakhiya- do you actually have read these full rehitnamas that you are quoting the rehitnamas or just quoting it from sikhitothemax.com or other websites?

I believe this trend of quoting the rehitnamas from sikhitothemax.com or various websites is causing misinterpretation of rehitnamas in general because rehitnamas are not read fully, critical analysis of which rehitnamas as whole is gurmat, shady, not credible, unreliable and various context of parts of rehitnamas are ignored just like context of gurbani are ignored.

For eg: Prem Sumarag has many good things, one of things were naam dridtha and keeping naam vidhi gupt. But if one reads this prem sumarag granth fully there are some stuff which just doesn't fit in Gurmat Sidhant. You may want to read this yourself to believe me, you can pick up english translations of this granth by mcleod.. here are some of the beliefs written in this granth:

on page 19 it is written that you should slander the Prophet if you are being attacked by a muslim. It talks about how if turk wanted to take khanda di pahul.. khalsa should bury their body up to neck in sand first so that their tat(elements) could be purified, it also talks about turkh who wants to convert should eat pork for 51 days in order to "purify" them from their muslim background (page 54)

page 93 talks about women being veiled and in the chapter on marriage it is said that the bride should wear a burka. Has this been a practice among sikhs in the early days? It says all women except prostitutes should wear a purda

on page 68 it talks about women and their period and says that a woman should bathe three days after her period has ended. does is mean she can't bathe in between?

2nd example is from bhai dya singh rehitnama where in the rehitnama it talks about specific diet,/life style lot of people adhere to that specific diet/life style based on this rehitnama, pushes their ultra firm views based on the rehitnama and witch haunts people but on the same rehitnama it also talks about khalsa can live his life/have diet in any of three gunas- rajo, tamo, satoguni.

I think one of sikh scholars in academia put it very nicely on his take on prem sumarag granth along with other rehitnamas

Prem Sumarg represents evolved local traditions and maryada, as do most rehitnamai , with the primary basis having an authentic foundation, and it have being added to since, reflecting the Khalsa's changing environment and challenges over time.

What i find interesting is groups have used lines from rehitnamas, puratan granths for their own advantage to prove their point but if someone uses same rehitnama to put their beleif forward all of sudden that challenges their mindset ..they even go as far rejecting the rehitnama..the same rehitnama they quote to support their beleifs and they call it, they are been altered by anti sikhs forces which is quite hypocritical...there are few solutions to this:

Solution 1)

one should either accept the full rehitnamas and its contents even though its contrary to their beliefs if they wish to gain any credibility or one shouldn't quote from rehitnamas or do pick and chose to push their beliefs instead they should admit this what we believe in based on our teachers and thats it..end of it.. no need to justify to claim your supermacy in the panth.

Solution 2)

Solutions 2 requires bibek buddhi and unbias attitude when doing analysis on rehitnamas with kausati of gurbani along with contexts and timing of rehitnamas even though it challenges their beleif..such people are real scholars who don't judge rehitnamas based on their standards or scan various rehitnamas and pick and chose to support their beleif or their group beleif. They have one goal only which is provide sangat with explanation of rehitnamas without their bias but reasoning the contents of rehitnamas.

This post is not direct towards any jatha specific but its general observation practiced by not one just jatha or samparda as whole ...but few individuals in every group, jatha, samparda in the panth who are hell bent to show their group supremacy in the panth.

[Mithar]

I don't agree that we should have to accept the WHOLE rehetnama or nothing of it at all. It's not as black and white as that. Only those parts should be accepted which are in accordance to Sikh cannonical writings, the rest which go against it should be ignored. These rehetnamas are a part of our ancient writings and need to be studied. They should not be discarded because a few things in it are not in accordance to Gurbani.