Saint Kabir 1398 A.D - 1448 A.D

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Saint Kabir 1398 A.D - 1448 A.D

 

Saint Kabir Das (kabir, Arabic for " great " , dasa, Sanskrit for " slave "

or " servant " ), is widely acknowledged as one of the great personality

of the Bhakti movement in North India. He was as is widely

acknowledged born in Year 1398 A.D.

He is one of the medieval Indian saints of Bhakti and Sufi movement.

Kabir lived in the fifteenth Century after Christ, which was a time of

great political upheaval in India. As is true of many contemporary

religious teachers, very little reliable information concerning

Kabir's life is available, though there is no dearth of legend

gathering around him. Kabir's life was centered around Kashi, also

called Banaras (Varanasi) Legend has it that he was actually the son

of a Brahmin widow who abandoned him and that he was found by a Muslim

weaver named Niru, who adopted the boy and taught him the weaver's

trade. It is not clear whether he ever married, but tradition gives

him a wife named Loi and two children. His caste was that of Julaha

and from his sayings his caste's heriditary occupation of weaving. On

the basis of modern research, it seems probable that Kabir belonged to

a family of non-celibate yogis converted, not long before and to a

considerable degree superficially to Islam. From the writings of Kabir

it seems that his knowledge of Islam was slight, rather in his

poetical utterances (Bani) a wealth of Hathayoga terminology and a

thought structure which bears obvious resemblance to Nath Yogis. Nath

Yogis in addition to the yogic conception that all truth is

experimental, i.e. to be realized within the body with the aid of

psycho-physical practices, concentration, control of breathing and

thus making the body incorruptible and the yogis immortal.

Bhakti movement was started by hindu saints while Sufi mysticism by

Muslim saints in medieval India (1200-1700). Kabir immensely

contributed to the Bhakti Movement and is considered a pioneer of

Bhakti along with Ravidas, Farid, and Namdev. His concept of love as a

path of suffering may possibly indicate, in some measure, a debt to

the Sufis. These and other elements from Nath tradition, bhakti and

sufism, kabir combined with his own mystical nature and produced

synthesis which is the distinctive religion of Kabir. Tradition tells

us that Swami Ramanand was his Guru (a teacher).

In fifteenth century, Benaras was the seat of Brahmin orthodoxy and

their learning center. Brahmins had strong hold on all the spheres of

life in this city. Thus Kabir belonging to a low caste of Julaha had

to go through immense tough time of preaching his idealogy. Kabir and

his followers would gather at one place in the city and meditate.

Brahmins ridiculed him for preaching to prostitutes and other low

castes. Kabir satirically denounced Brahmins and thus won hearts of

people around him. There is no doubt that single most famous important

person from the city of Benaras today is none other than Saint Kabir.

Kabir through his couplets not only reformed the mindset of common

villagers and low caste people but give them self confidence to

question Brahmins. It was 100 years after him that Tulsidas broke the

hegemony of Brahmins by writing Ram Charitra Manas, a poem of Ramayana

at Benaras which went against the tradition of Brahmins. Kabir was in

fact first person to go against Brahmins and be so successfull.

Benaras was devasted by an attack by a Muslim invader Tamur Lang or

" Tamur the lame " during his time. Kabir also denounced mullahs and

their rituals of bowing towards kaba five times a day. Because of open

condemnation of established and popular religoins, Kabir became an

object of the wrath of both Hindus and Muslims in and around Benaras.

Kabir travelled in and around Benaras to preach his beliefs.

Kabir believed in sell-surrender and God's bhakti. The Kabirpanthis

follow a lite of singing the praises of God, prayers and a simple and

pure life of devotion. Kabir recommends ceaseless singing of God's

praises. He virtually suggests withdrawal from the world. He is

against al1 ritualistic and ascetic methods as means to salvation. It

is true that Kabir refers to some yogic terms in describing the

meditational and mystic methods of the yogis. But, there is no ground

to suggest that he himself recommends the yogic path. In fact, far

from recommending yoga, he is quite strong in condemning ascetic or

yogic methods, and says that yogis, in their meditations, become prey

to maya. The point wil1, however be considered further while comparing

Radical bhakti with Nathism.

The moral tone is quite strong in Kabir's hymns. " Kabir deck thyself

with garments of love. Love them is given honour whose body and soul

speak the truth. " " The ruby of goodness is greater than all thc mines

of rubies, all the wealth of three worlds resides in the goodness of

heart. When thc wealth of contentment is won, all other wealth is as

dust. " " Where there is mercy, there is strength, where there is

forgivenesss there is He. " " The man who is kind and practises

righteousness, who remains passive in the aftairs of the world, who

considers creatures of the world as his own self, he attains the

immortal Being; the true God is ever with him. Kabir suggests inward

worship and remembrance of God. For him, true worship is only inwards.

Put on the rosary inward. By counting beads, the world will be full of

light. He clearly suggests moral discrimination betwecn good and bad

deeds. What can the helpless road do, when the traveller does not walk

understandingly. " What can one do, if, with lamp in hand, one falls in

the well. " " Or goes astray with open eyes. Discern ye now between good

and evil. "

It is not surprising that Kabir's satire was brought to bear not

simply on the vices and weaknesses of men but reached through and

beyond them to the very system themselves. It was the authority of

Vedas and Quran that more then the authority of Brahmin or Qazi which

Kabir attacked. He rebelled against the pretension of resolving by the

means of books or by way of authority, the mystery of human conditions

and the problem of liberation (Moksha). He spent his last 40 days

living in a place where it was believed that if you die you will born

as a Donkey in next life.

Kabir is a firm advocate of ahimsa. His doctrine extends even to the

nondestruction of flowers. " The life of the living you strike dead

and you say your slaughter makes it dedicated. It is blood haunting

you and those who taught you. " " They fast all day, and at night they

slaughter the cow; here murder, there devotion; how can this please

God? O' Kazi, by whose order doth thou use thy knife. " " When you

declare the sacrifice of an animal as your religion, what else is sin.

If you regard yourself a saint, whom will you call a butcher ? " " The

goat eats grass and is skinned, what will happen to those who eat

(goat's) meat? " Do not kill poor jiva, murder will not be forgiven

even if you hear a million Puranas. Among the fifty commandments laid

down for the followers of Kabir, vegetarianism is one of them. For

Kabir, moral life involves adherence to ahimsa.

In common with all monastic, ascetic or otherworldly sects, Kabir does

not think well of women. Ihere is almost a tirade against them in the

hymns of Kabir. Woman is characterised as " a black cobra', thc pit of

hell and the refuse of the world. " She is considered to be a hurdle in

the path of thc spiritual progress of man. He spoke, " woman ruins

everything when she comes near a man; Devotion, salvation and divine

knowledge no longer enter his soul. " His views, about woman are also

evident from all his vehement attacks against maya. Almost everywhere

he links maya to a woman who is out to entice and entrap man, and

destroy his spiritual lifc. Such views about woman from a married

person arc, indeed, quite uncommon. The cosmological views of Kabir

give a clear clue to his worldview. He finds Niranjana to be the

creator of the world; maya or woman. And this woman stands between man

and god. She is there to entice him away from Him.

Kabir composed no systematic treatise, rather his work consists of

many short didactic poems, often expressed in terse vigorous language

in the form of Padas, Dohas, and Ramainis (forms of poetry in Indian

languages). Besides his work recorded in 1604 A.D. in Guru Granth

Sahib by Guru Arjan Dev, Nanak V, and preserved inviolate since, two

other collections exist - Kabir Granthavali, and Bijak. In his poems,

he was quick to tell the illustrations of moral and spiritual truth in

the incidents of everyday life , and many of his similes and metaphors

are very striking.