Guru Granth
Sahib recognizes many saints of the Bhakti movement of medieval India. Kabir,
Farid, Namdev are the saints belonging to this movement which swept across the
North India from 1100 A.D. till 1600 A.D. When Fifth Guru Guru Arjan dev ji
compiled Guru Granth Sahib, he decided to give some recognition to the saints of
Bhakti movement, that is the reason that Guru Granth Sahib contains verses of
such saints. In some cases Guru Granth Sahib is the only voice remained for such
saints over the years.
According to the
generally accepted version of the current traditions, Namdev was born in AD 1270
to Damasheti, a low-caste tailor, and his wife, Gonabai, in the village of
Naras-Vamani, in Satara district of Maharashtra. Janabai, the family's
maidservant and a bhakta and poetess in her own right, records the tradition
that Namdev was born to Gonabai as a result of her worship of Vitthala in
Pandharpur. Namdev was married before he was eleven years of age to Rajabal,
daughter of Govinda sheti Sadavarte. He had four sons and one daughter, Under
the influence of saint Jnanadeva, Namdev was converted to the path of bhakti.
Vitthala of Pandharpur was now the object of his devotion and he spent much of
his time in worship and kirtan, chanting mostly verses of his own composition.
In the company of Jnanadeva and other saints, he roamed about the country and
later came to the Punjab where he is said to have lived for more than twenty
years at Ghuman, in Gurdaspur district, where a temple in the form of samadh
still preserves his memory. This temple was constructed by Sardar Jassa Singh
Ramgarhia and the tank by its side was got repaired by Rani Sada Kaur ,
mother-in-law of Maharaja Ranjit Singh . In his early fifties, Namdev settled
down at Pandharpur where he gathered around himself a group of devotees. His
abhangas or devotional lyrics became very popular, and people thronged to listen
to his kirtan. Namdev's songs have been collected in Namdevachi Gatha which also
includes the long autobiographical poem Tirathavah. His Hindi verse and his
extended visit to the Punjab carried his fame far beyond the borders of
Maharashtra. Sixty-one of his hymns in fact came to be included in Sikh
Scripture, the Guru Granth Sahib. These hymns or sabdas share the common
characteristic of lauding the One Supreme God distinct from his earlier verse
which carries traces of idolatry and saguna bhakti. In the course of his
spiritual quest, Namdev had, from being a worshipper of the Divine in the
concrete form, become a devotee of the attributeless ( nirguna) Absolute.
Bhagat Nam Dev
is a pioneer of the Radical bhakti School. Though he appeared a century earlier
than Kabir, his religious and social views are very much like those of Kabir. He
unambiguously repudiates all the four fundamentals of Vaisnavism. Though in his
devotional approach, he is clearly a monotheist, he makes many pantheistic
statements too, e.g., every thing is God; there is nothing but God; consider the
world and God to be one; the foam and the water are not different. Chaturvedi
writes: "Sant Nam Dev seemed to believe both in transcendence and
immanence, in pantheism and nondualism. His devotion was purely of the non-attributional
absolute. He also considers God to be immanent, everywhere, in all hearts, and
the Creator of everything. Like Kabir and the Sufis, Namdev is very other
worldly. He says, "The strength of contempt of the world should be in the
body an unchanging companion. One should lay aside differences between oneself
and others, and feel no anxiety for things of the world."Ranade also
writes: "He (Nam Dev) tells us that it is impossible that the pursuit of
God can be coupled with a life of Samsara. If it had been possible for a man to
find God while he was pursuing Samsara, then Sanaka and others would not have
grown mad after God. If it had been possible for him to see God while carrying
on the duties of a householder, the great Suka would not have gone to the forest
to seek God. Had it been possible for people to find God in their homes, they
would not have left them to fond out. Nam Dev has left all these things, and is
approaching God in utter submission (Abhg. 83).
NamDev's
cosmogenic views are also orthodox. He says that God created maya and "maya
is the name of the power that placeth man in the womb."Indirectly, he is
neither happy with the world, nor with the human birth. Him, shop, shopkeeper,
men and everything are unreal excepting God. In this background he seeks release
from the world and suggests renunciation: " Namdev gave up trade, and
devoted himself exclusively to the worship of God.
The world being
a play of maya and not being a worthwhile of spiritual endeavours, Namdev's goal
is to have union with God through devotion and singing. His praises. He says,
"I perform worship, sing God's praises and meditate on Him for eight pahar
in a day i.e, round the clock. At the same time, he suggests good conduct and
purity of life. For, God created all men alike. Though he holds every person
responsible lor his acts, he clearly does not believe in a world rigidly
governed by karma. 13ecause he says: If everything were determined by karma, who
created karma originally?
NamDev not only
claims union with God, but, like Kabir, also states that more than once God
miraculously intervened on his behalf to reveal Himself to him, or help him.
Without doubt, Nam Dev's approach remains otherworldly both before and after his
achievement. At one time, he even gave up work so as to remain absorbed in his
worship and meditations. He never initiated any religious institution or
movement. His was a solitary search for God, without creating any social or
religious organisation.
We find that in
his repudiation of Vaisnava doctrines, in his metaphysical ideas, methodology
and goal, and more particularly in his otherworldly approach to the world and
society, Namdev's views are quite identical with those of Kabir.
