Kabir - The Most Quoted Poet Of Today
Kabir was born in early fifteen century whose works are sill recited in twenty-first century. The most quoted poet of today, Kabir, his famous Dohas and his philosophies remain critically relevant to contemporary times. What makes this comtemporary poet a motivvation for many today? Who was Kabir? What influenced him?Why is his poems still recited by many? The multi faceted and dynamic personality of the Kabir is perfectly described by Sehdev Kumar as a fish in Brazalian river who with a twin lensed eye surveys the watery dept in which it resides and examine the upper world of air and sunshine through the other (Kumar).
Kabir in his poetry tries to express limitlessness of the universe through the limitation of language. It remains important to understand the setting in which various works of Kabir was written. The social setting will remains vital to get the crux of Kabir's "immortal" work. Kabir through his poems reflects and depicts his own time and culture but was never a critique to any school or thoughts or any philosophy.Kabir widely addressed as Sant Kavi was born in Varanasi in the early fifteenth century. He was born in a weavers family and it is well accepted that he was a disciple of Ramanand.
Though he was a Muslim by religion and trained by a Hindu guru, he opposed the organized religious practices in both Hinduism and Islam. He was therefore intellectually autonomous and unbiased and an opinion that Kabir’s motive was to establish a community with Hindu Muslim brotherhood might not be true. Such an inference is also evident from one of his poems which states that the idea of worship is seen as a matter of pride in the communities that worship a certain God . He observes that Hindus worship Ram and Muslims worship Rahim and then they quarrel amongst each other. Kabir questions this practice because apparently both are doing more or less the same thing by worshipping mere rock idols as if they have never heard of soul or are completely unaware of it.
Kabir’s poems that I came across are two types, ones which are emotional and addressed to God and others are satirical pieces on the social evils in the society in which he uses strong words. I in this paper will be dealing with the latter part. Kabir has a persona that was held differently by different people according to their religious believes and they extracted different meanings from this poems according to their own understanding and sufferings. For a spiritual seeker, Kabir is a great Yogi, like Tagore who shines like a beacon in the blinding storm. He is Mahatama for oppressed , who spoke in their own tongue against the morass of untouchablity . For men of letters, Kabir is a poet par excellence, the like of whom 'in a thou sand years of Hindi literature, there has not been quite another.
Kabir's admiration can be seen by the fact that he was given different titles by different. Muslims brothers remember him as Kabir Shah, 'the great King, Hindus often call him Kabir-das; meaning 'the holy servant', The Sikhs revered him as Kabir-Sahib, or 'Master-Kabir' and for the Sufis, Kabir is a Pir; for the Vaisnavas a Bhagat; whose vision is not marred by orthodoxy or dogma which prevailed during that time (Bahuguna) . Nevertheless for all the claims made, for the common people of India, Kabir remains Sant Kabir. It is worth noting that Kabir's simple messages of love was not narrated in Sanskrit that was considered to be the language of upper caste and Brahmins but in own dialect of Hindi. To better understand the context of social setting in the fifteenth century there is no better lense than to study Bhakti movement of that time which explain the socio-culture prevailing at that time.
Bhakti and Kabir
The inception of the Bhakti movement heralded a new era in the Indian society and culture during fifteenth century. The movement manifested itself in numerous forms of expression like of religion, philosophy and language. The Bhakti movement was more of a pan-Indian uprising of a people’s culture against feudalism. The establishment of castes and the growth of regional languages and their literature led to a multitude of changes which resulted in the emergence of this Bhakti movement. The bhakti movement recognised that the social systems as unfair and discriminatory and questioned their validity. Also bhakti literature was rooted in the people’s regional languages which allowed a higher degree of creative freedom while in the process of expressing their emotions and opinions. The people oriented literature of the Bhakti period is different not only in form and contents but it is quite novel and free from classicist literatures of Sanskrit, Pali, Prakrit and Apabhransha.
The essence of the Bhakti poetry stems from experiences of common people and their culture. There is a very close relation between the Bhakti movement and literature on the one hand and the socioeconomic changes taking place in the beginning of 12th century. The lower castes which much deprived of economic and education opportunities got a chance to express their grievances and emotions through the growth of the regional languages (Iwao Shima,tejii sakata,Katyusuki). Their experiences and their poetic practice were rooted in common life. This refutation and which is found in Saint poetry is an expression of rebellion against the feudal society and its ideologies.
Ram Vilas Sharma has said that Bhakti Movement was not restricted to any particular class. All classes including farmers, traders and craftsmen were involved in a rebellion against the priests, religious hypocrisy, casteism and against social discrimination between the high and low classes (Sharma).Though Kabir advocated Bhakti, i.e. devotion, his Bhakti seems to be nirguna Bhakti, i.e., not believing in any form of God rather considers God as something that permeates all animate and inanimate things.
Kabir and Rationality
The research shows that rationalism centres on “reason”, “evidence”, “experience” and “logical structure” and researchers also believed that Kabir’s poems reveals that his philosophy adheres to parameters of experience and he seems not to be ready to accept anything that cannot pass the test of reason. If we both keep that argument toghter then we can say that Kabir was indeed rational (Bhojani). Few notable citations are Your Lord is near: yet you are climbing the palm-tree to seek Him. The Brâhman priest goes from house to house and initiates people into faith: Alas! the true fountain of life is beside you, and you have set up a stone to worship. (Das)Here Kabir appears to express his strong disapproval of the very idea that God is outside and we have to seek Him outside. Besides, the above-quoted lines also reveal how meaningless the Brahman’s ritual is.In another poem, “It is needless to ask of a saint the caste to which he belongs” Kabir logically refutes barriers of castes. And the logic he proposes clearly shows the meaning of the word “reason” as it has been used in the above-given definitions of rationalism.
From the 12th century onward, a curious phenomenon began to take place, travelling men of religion- muslim sufis and hindu sadhus- realised that they had a lot in common. Kabir did not care for any religion which existed in a superstructure. There was no rigid structure to the religion that he espoused and followed. He speaks of Allah and interchanges that indifferently for Ram and Krishna. His dohas(couplets) are evidence of the influence that Persian sufi poets like Hafiz and Rumi had on him and in Kabir’s time, the muslim influence was predominantly in the form of Sufism. Kabir was impressed by the ethical monotheism of Islam and acquired a strong distaste for the static formalism of much of Hindu worship such as pilgrimages, asceticism, the worship of idols and bathing in the Ganges.
One of his notable work is If God be within the mosque, then to whom does this world belong? If Ram be within the image which you find upon your pilgrimage, then who is there to know what happens without? Hari is in the East: Allah is in the West. Look within your heart, for there you will find both Karim and Ram; All the men and women of the world are His living forms. Kabir is the child of Allah and of Ram: He is my Guru, He is my Pir. (hess) In this poem, Kabir seems to reject the popular belief that God is in mosques or in idol and seems to agree that God is neither in east nor in west but he lives within a person. According to him Sant Kavi god exist everywhere and knows everyone. He is aware to everyone's thought and personality.
Thus, the researches thinks that Kabir views God as a pure omniscient consciousness. Kabir’s very declaration “All the men and women of the world are His living forms” (Snatak)is a culmination of his humanist rationalism. Besides, his words “Kabîr is the child of Allah and of Ram: He is my Guru, He is my Pir” concisely articulate his disapproval of and objection to divisions of religions. Some consider that Kabir’s rationalism and radical humanism, makes him a merely a social reformer, but a closer look at his poems reveals that after all he looks to be a spiritual person having faith in humanity, though he may not be a religious person. He preaches humanity through religion. He refrain from praising any god but merely highlight the qualities and values of that god. He calls for spiritual awakening within the wide strata of society at large.
Social Reformer
It's the basic nature of humanist to concern himself with welfare of humanity at large and tries to eradicate the evils of the society, Kabir also seems to have prepared himself to fight evil prevalent in the society during the Bhakti movement and without mincing his words he appeared to reveal theevils like hypocrisy, superstitions, disparity on basis of castes and idolatry While his writings are a scathing comment on the socio-religious-ideological inconsistencies of that period, they also contain a vision for a new society (Krishna). Kabir has blatantly refuted all the meaningless rituals and practices that prevailed during that time and contradicted the concept of rationality and humanity.
A very prominent work of Kabir that provide this glimpse is O man, if thou dost not know thine own Lord, whereof art thou so proud? Put thy cleverness away: mere words shall never unite thee to Him. Do not deceive thyself with the witness of the Scriptures: Love is something other than this, and he who has sought it truly has found it. I do not ring the temple bell: I do not set the idol on its throne: I do not worship the image with flowers. It is not the austerities that mortify the flesh which are pleasing to the Lord, When you leave off your clothes and kill your senses, you do not please the Lord. (Kulshreshtha)It is believed that those days learned Brahmin and powerful people had a great influence on the society and many times they misused the power and suppressed others under the name of caste , religions and its practices .
Being a humanist, Kabir could not stand this kind of injustice, so he harshly attacked rote learning of scriptures. In the following lines, he has to express his disbelief in other religious rites that dehumanise and discriminate people. As easily figured and mentioned in the poem Kabir seems to consider idolatry a useless rite and, therefore, he appears to want people to rid themselves of this unnecessary activity. Neither does he think that mortification of our body can lead us to enlightenment or spiritual awakening. Kabir’s progressiveness can be attributed to his humanist approach. The researcher holds the view that this singer of the eternal truth is as pertinent today as he was during his own time because the vices like casteism, disparity, superstitions, futile rituals and other evils are still looming large during our time as well (Vyas).
Kabir also seems to have strongly protested any kind of disparity and division based on caste system and advocated equality among all people. With very convincing examples, Kabir explained that the differences are merely differences of naming and are not real. As in one of his poem Kabir uses the element of nature to explain that even the mighty nature does not compare then why narrow minded humans hold any form of inequality for their brothers. The river and its waves are one surf: where is the difference between the river and its waves? When the wave rises, it is the water; and when it falls, it is the same water again. Tell me, Sir, where is the distinction? Because it has been named as wave, shall it no longer be considered as water?
Within the Supreme Brahma, the worlds are being told like beads: Look upon that rosary with the eyes of wisdomKabir was non-believer in God but a firm believer in humanity .Kabir seems to have realised that following a particular set of scriptures inevitably involved in blindly believing in some methods that later leads into blind rituals and idolising some exponents, without any rational base. In other words, Kabir seemed to be well aware that following any scriptures mostly leads to bigotry and fanaticism and when scriptures rule minds of people a true human voice gets muffled. Kabir might have perceived two threats on the path of Bhakti—first, cults, and second, scriptures.
The researcher is of the view that a cult does not allow a person to look at things objectively, i.e., one’s observation and reactions are coloured by the philosophy of the cult one follows. Similarly, scriptures can guide one as long as they are taken as great literature but when they acquire the status of words of God and therefore unquestionable dogmas, they hamper our thinking and render us bigoted (Vyas, scriptures).The struggle of Kabir is indeed amazing, considering the period in which he waged that struggle. He spoke of ending the divine rule and nurtured dreams of establishing the rule of the people.
