Literature review: the Guru Granth Sahib (Scholars on Guru Granth

Sahib part 1)
Here I have attempted to present some of the analytical works on Guru Granth
Sahib or contribution of scholarly views on Guru Granth Sahib by Sikh and
western scholars. The earlier writing on the history and nature of Guru Granth
Sahib had begun during and after its canonization, which are now known as
traditional literature. Sikhism and Guru Granth Sahib are interrelated names. But
when we attempt to explain Sikhism we attempt to set down its political, social
and religious history ranging from its beginning to the present times. Sikhs before
and after the post colonial era had significantly participated in history and later on
with the transmigrations to outside India had acquired a new term Diaspora.
Sikhism as a study incorporates all the latest and old aspects religion and its
history, Sikh personalities (both historical and contemporary), diaspora, code of
conduct, state, government, institutions, geography, demography etc. But we
have confined our writing to the hymns of the Guru Granth Sahib. This draft will
deal with the writings which have explained Significance the Guru Granth Sahib
alone as the holy text. We will attempt to study some of the modern scholars who
have contributed much and their critical observation has helped further to add
more quality to the study of Guru Granth Sahib. Scholars have attempted to
study Guru Granth Sahib from almost all of its aspects. Scholars have viewed
Guru Granth Sahib from various points of view like its history, hagiography,
hermeneutics, doctrinal evolution, inter religious dialogue, mysticism, musicology,
metaphysics, ecology as an issue and theme, gender, structure of Bani, dialects,
ethics, symbols and metaphors, philosophy and translation. Scholars who have
translated the Guru Granth Sahib in English are Pritam Singh Chahil (four vols.),
G S Makin (five vols.), Gopal Singh (four vols.), Manmohan Singh (8 vols.) and
Gurbachan Singh Talib (four vols.). Max Macauliffe and Ernest Trumpp were the
first western non Sikh English translators of the Guru Granth Sahib.

My area of study in Guru Granth Sahib is its dialogical properties. Though

scholars and researchers have talked about external form of dialogues
embedded in the very structure of the Guru Granth Sahib, yet there was no

attempt have been made to study its hetroglot character. My attempt will reach
out to the internal dialogical properties of the Guru Granth Sahib. Scholars have
pointed out the dialogue between the Guru Granth Sahib and other faith systems
or religious sects. There is sufficient literature available which talk about various
features or properties of Guru Granth Sahib for eg. Social or religious philosophy,
structure of the Granth Sahib, music in Guru Granth Sahib, metaphysics, role of
women, nature and ecology, dialogical process This kind of attempt will be new
and constructive. It will help us to view the whole Guru Granth Sahib as a social
discourse internally filled with dialogical voices. We contend that the Guru Granth
Sahib is not a mono ideational discourse.

Scholars on Guru Granth Sahib

There is considerable number of works on the Guru Granth Sahib. The scholars
have attempted to study almost all the aspects of the Guru Granth Sahib. The
traditional (16th and 17th century) literature like Janam Sakhies, Mahima
Parkash Gurbilas Patshahi chhevi, Suraj Parkash Sikha di Bhagatmala and
Twarikh sikh khalsa are more concerned with hagiographic elements of the
Gurus and the writing of the sants. The modern critical study of Guru Granth
Sahib began in the early 20 th century with the scholars like Sahib Singh and Teja
Singh (Gurinder Singh Mann) who analyzed the Guru Granth Sahib by making
textual analysis of the Granth. Along with Sahib Singh and Teja Singh, the works
of Dr. Charan Singh and Dr. Ganda Singh are also note worthy. Most of the
works by these authors deal with the historical and theological significance of the
Guru Granth Sahib. They have attempted to portray the complete picture of the
Granth by analyzing it from its history to the internal structure of the Granth. With
the opening of research centers and universities in sixtees in Punjab, more and
more scholars had started analyzing the Guru Granth Sahib critically. The works
of Surinder Singh Kohli, Mohinder Kaur Gill, Piara Singh Padam, Piara Singh
Sambhi, Giani Gurdit Singh, J S Grewal and some other Hindi scholars like
Jayaram Mishra and Manmohan Sehgal have contributed recognized works.
Outside India the Sikh Scholars like Pashuara Singh and Gurinder Singh Maan

are noteworthy. Western scholars like W H Mcleod, W Owen Cole, Eleanor

Nesbit, Noel Q King, David Scott, Karine schomer and Christopher shackle are
some of the prominent western non sikh scholars who viewed the history and
Guru Granth Sahib from their critical perspective. W H Mcleod is considered
more authentic and reliable western scholar. He has deep knowledge on Sikhism
in general and the compositions in Guru Granth Sahib in Particular. He compiled
a comprehensive dictionary on Sikhism which covers all important terms and
names relevant to Sikhism. He offers his critical observation on the Puratan
Janam Sakhies (traditional literature on Guru Nanak Dev ji). He finds that except
Moharbans Janamsakhi, the rest are less reliable and authentic. He also admits
that such traditional literature can not be ignored completely due to its internal
lack of logic, yet he acknowledges that we can not underestimate what is
available as written matter. In his paper, The influence of Islam upon the
thoughts of Guru Nanak, Mcleod analyses the temperament of the time when
Guru Nanak Dev composed his hymns. He categorically rejects the claims of
others who had found that the writings of Guru Nanak Dev were directly
influenced from Quran or Islam. Mcleod clears the picture by saying that there
was no direct influence of Quran or Islam, though the time was dominant with
Islamic teaching and governance. He finds that Guru Nanak was aware with Sufi
tradition but he was not directly influenced by Sufis. On the other hand Mcloed
claims that the sufi vocabulary or spirit reached to him through the Bhakhti
tradition. Sufism, Mcleod claims, in Punjab at that time was different from the
core Islamic teachings and theology. Sufism in Punjab had taken new form when
common people had started orienting towards it. The proponents of Sufism in
Punjab had taken local colour and langauge which reached to the common
devotees through oral recitation. Though Mcleod does not identify any direct
influence of Islam, yet he notices the pervasive nature of Islam in Guru Nanaks
writing.
The stress upon Guru Nanaks Sant inheritance should not lead us into a variety
of misunderstanding which commonly occurs in discussion relating to
antecedents and influences. It should not imply any denial of the originality of
Guru Nanaks thoughts. The fact that a man works with elements which have
been provided by others should not necessarily suggest that the product
of his labors is not particularly his own. Others will supply the threads, but
the pattern which he weaves with them may be a design of singular

originality. In the case of Guru Nanak, this was the certainty the result.

Eleanor Nesbitt in his Sikhism- A Very Short Introduction traces all facets of
Sikhism. His explanation starts from Sikh history and its development of scripture
to the present diaspora of Punjabi emigrants in Europe and North America. He
offers some statistics of Punjabi people in and outside India and their proportion
to the whole population of the world. Eleanor Nesbitt like Mcleod finds the claims
of Sikhism as an amalgamation of two earlier traditions (Hinduism and Islam) as
speculations. But he makes some good etymological relation between Punjabi
language (used in Guru Granth Sahib) and European languages. He finds that
the morphological part of Punjab which is pan is cognate with Greek pente and
German flinf and ab from Panjab is a distant relative of the latin aqua. The
word nam in the Guru Granth Sahib is more or less similar to the English word
name. Similarly the sikh word amrit as used in sikh rituals of initiation is
cognate with latin word ambrosia. Apart from telling the scriptural history of the
Guru Granth Sahib and the Gurus, Nesbitt familiarizes the reader with the
modern Sikh history (from Sikh Gurudwara reform movement to the political
glitches in nineteen eighties and nineties). Another prominent western scholar
Noel Q King in his paper Orientalism, Critical Scholarship and the Sikh Religion
points out the reason that why western scholars have not turned much attention
to the study of Guru Granth Sahib and Sikhism in general. He points out that the
scriptural research and study takes years of residence. Most of the scholars and
western translators had to stay for long years in India for translation or writing
other critical things about the Guru Granth Sahib. He also admits that till recently
less instruments and sources were available for scholars visiting India. The major
difficulty in analyzing scripture is its use of multiple languages. One has not only
needed to learn Punjabi, yet he has to struggle with Arabic, Persian, old
Gurmukhi and other dialects which were used at the individual compositions
before being compiled into a scripture.
Karine Schomer in his work The Sants: Studies in a Devotional Tradition of
India, presents his thoughts on the origin and the character of bhakti movement.
Karine Schomer was more concerned with overall bhakti traditions and their
exponents. Karine tracks down the various traditions of the bhakti movement and
their theological and historical differences. He identifies these traditions as the

Vaishnava and Saiva Siddanta traditions of Tamil south, the traditional devotion
of Ram in central India, the tradition of worshipping of goddess Kali in Bangal,
the chaitanya tradition in Bengal, Krishnaite tradition of Vallabha in western India
and the Sant tradition in the central part of India. Karine like many of his
contemporary scholars divides the bhakti movement into two major groups. First
group was of Sants or poets who believed in manifested form of God had its
early beginning in the seventh century. That is saguna bhakti and the people in
such group worshipped the vaishnava God named Vitthala or Vithova. It was
worshipped in the area like Maharashtra. Janeshwar, Tukaram, Eknath and
Namdev were founding Sant poets who belonged to Vithoba sect and preserved
the core vaishnava ideals among marathi speaking people in Maharashtra. In
north India situation was more different, the Sant tradition in India was more
widely distributed and different from each group in its cluster. Though they had
considerable difference in their form of prayer, yet there was some similarity
among such diverse groups. They all believed in the Nirguna aspect of God. The
sants/poets of this second group believed in nirguna bhakti a formless and
immanent personal God.
While defining the characteristics of Northern Bhakti parampara , Karine schomer
finds the institutional and historical fragmentation in the bhakti groups functioning
in the fifteenth century. Karine Schomer updates the reader that some recent
scholarship does not find any diverse groups or sects active in the fifteenth
century bhakti period. They claim that northern bhakti movement was
represented by individual sants and poets of the time. While tracing the history of
northern bhakti movement Schomer tells the reader that Ramanand was the
founding source of northern bhakti movement who had set up his rebel camp
against the core vaishnava ideals of Ramanuja- the teacher of Tamil vaishnavite.
His two major disciples had later on taken diverse movements. One of them was
Tulsidas who had taken saguna movement which ideally represented and
believed in the manifested qualities of God and another was represented by
Kabir who claimed the nirguna form of divine. In the succeeding years, Kabir had
influenced two major figures Guru Nanak and Dadu Dyal. Guru Nanak founded
the sikh panth and Dadu dyal formed dadu panth in Rajasthan. Karine claims that
out of three historical communities namely Kabir Panth, Sikh panth and Dadu
panth only the sikh community had attained a considerable growth in its
expansion which has distinctly separated it from other traditions like Hinduism or

earlier Sant traditions. Karine schomer also talks about the poet sants of 18 th and
19th century sant tradition. Though they could not evolve like Sikh tradition, yet
they had good influence on their near territories.
David Scott in his paper Buddhism: Sikh Encounters and Convergences
attempts to track a direct encounter between Indian Buddhist strands like Tantric
Buddhism and Sikh principles as propounded by Guru Nanak thought. Guru
Nanaks use of the names like many krishnas, shivas, siddhas, Buddhas
prompt David Scott to believe that the use of the name Buddha is nowhere a
mere generic use. He tries to track down the possibility of any encounter
between Guru Nanak and Buddhist teachers. David Scott mentions some reports
of Guru Nanaks travel to Sri Lanka and Tibet and his encounter with Buddhist
adepts, yet the western scholars like Mcleod and Owen Cole reject any such
physical encounter between Guru Nanak and Buddhist adepts. Mcleod and
Owen Cole rely on Meharban JanamSakhi which does not mention any such
encounter. Yet the other three Janam Sakhies (hagiography) mention Guru
Nanaks Visit to Sri Lanka and upper regions of Himalaya. But Mcleod and Cole
do not give much recognition to these three early traditional sources. David Scott
finds some ideological linkage between Tibetan Buddhism and thoughts of Guru
Nanak. But Mcleod and Owen Cole argue that such ideological thoughts may
have come through the sant tradition and to the sant tradition it may have come
through the Hindu Nath yogis. And possibly these Nath yogis may have derived
these concepts from Tibetan Budhism. Scott mentions three concepts namely
sunna/sunyata (in Buddhism), Sahaj and Siddas. These terms take forms in the
Buddhist philosophy as well as in the thoughts of Guru Nanak. But Mcleod and
Cole claim that such thoughts of Guru Nanak may have come from the sant
tradition and the sant tradition might have received it from earliest sources like
Tantric Buddhism of most northern areas of India. David Scott hopes that further
study and research will find out the possible encounters between Buddhist
strands and the thoughts of Guru Nanak.