Chapter 6

GURU ANGAD DEV
(1504–1552)

It was five o clock in the morning. Lehna had got out of bed, bathed and now sat under the tamarind tree in his courtyard to meditate and pray. This had been his habit for so long that, Khivi, his wife, no longer knew when he got out of bed.

Usually Lehna was so lost in his prayers that he did not notice when the birds began to twitter. But now he was not able to concentrate and was aware of the beginning of the day and the first flutter of birds’ wings. This had happened often in the recent past and at first he had ascribed it to the restlessness that always possessed him at the approach of the Navratras. He was an ardent devotee of the Goddess Durga and during the Navratras, he led a pilgrimage to her temple at Jawalamukhi (in Kangra, Himachal Pradesh). The excitement of the impending pilgrimage had always made him restless. But then he remembered that the previous year, when the head priest of Jawalamukhi had finally brought him into the presence of the goddess, he did not feel the deep glow of happiness that he had always felt. There was a feeling of inadequacy, a feeling that there should have been something more at the end of the pilgrimage.

Now, sitting under the tree in his courtyard, he felt the same sense of inadequacy and knew that his inability to concentrate on his prayers was caused by something more deep-rooted than by the excitement of the impending pilgrimage. This realization made him uneasy and afraid. Then, from his neighbour’s courtyard, he heard a soft clear voice, raised in song. It was a strange hymn but the words gave him peace and strength and when the singer finished his song, Lehna was not afraid or restless any more.

All through the morning he helped his father. His father, Pheru, was a rich trader with a variety of business interests and there was a great deal of work to keep Lehna busy. But as he worked, his mind kept going back to the hymn and he wondered who had composed it. By mid-morning he could not bear not knowing any more: he knew he had to find the answer to this question. He excused himself from his work, and went to his neighbour Jodha’s house.

‘Tell me the name of the hymn you sang this morning and the name of the poet who wrote it,’ Lehna said, coming straight to the point.

Jodha had just sat down to his mid-day meal and he looked up at his neighbour and smiled and said, ‘It is the mool mantra written by my Guru, Guru Nanak of Kartarpur. Come and join me in my meal.’

‘Thank you,’ Lehna said, ‘but I must go. I have work to do.’

Lehna’s work was to persuade the members of his party to stop at Kartarpur on their way to Jawalamukhi. But his friends did not agree. If Lehna had not been the leader of the group, he would have broken from them and gone to Kartarpur on his own. But as the leader, he had certain duties and responsibilities which he could not give up, and so his visit to Guru Nanak had to wait.

Two days later, like the other pilgrims, Lehna too tied bells to his wrists and his ankles and they went on their way to the Devi, singing and dancing. But each time he clapped his hands and stamped his feet and sang Jai mata di, he would hear a soft, sweet voice in his head: Ik onkar, sat naam, karta purakh. Even when he came to the temple and went into the presence of the Goddess, it was Jodha’s voice that kept ringing in his ears.

It was a strange, emaciated Lehna who returned to Khadur. The other pilgrims reported that he had eaten very little, only nibbled at his food when they had forced him to eat. He had behaved in a strange, uncharacteristic manner by keeping very much to himself all through the pilgrimage.

Lehna stayed at Khadur only for two days after his return. Then, while everyone was asleep, he mounted his horse and rode to Kartarpur. He reached the Guru’s dera just before dawn. As Lehna rode into the dera he noticed a strange silence, everything was still and quiet. He got off his horse and tied a cloth around the horse’s hooves to muffle their sound, so that it would not intrude upon the silence. He came, as quietly as he could, to the centre of the dera and as he did so, he heard a strong beautiful voice break into the same hymn that Jodha had sung. ‘Ik onkar, sat naam, karta purakh…’ He was overcome by the beauty of the voice and of the hymn. He let go of the horse’s bridle and fell on his knees. He lowered his forehead to the ground and wept, and knew at last that this is what he had been searching for; he knew that he had come home.

After the morning prayers, Lehna went up to a Sikh disciple who seemed to be some kind of a leader because so many of the other disciples showed deference to him.

‘I am Lehna from Khadur,’ Lehna introduced himself. ‘I have come to have darshan of the Guru and to serve him,’ he added.

‘You are more than welcome, Lehna of Khadur. I am Bura Singh but people call me Bhai Budha,’ said the disciple.

Within a few days it was as if Lehna had always lived in Kartarpur. Wherever there was work to be done, Lehna was the first to reach out and attempt to do it. No task was too lowly, too menial for him.

With Lehna’s unstinting and devoted service, it was only a matter of time before the Guru noticed him.

Lehna had always been very fond of children. In Kartarpur, too, Lehna found great pleasure in being with the children. For a little while, before the evening prayers, he would join the children in their play and the whole dera would echo with the children’s laughter and people would stop and smile and shake their heads and say: ‘What a child this stranger is!’

The Guru had noticed the stranger’s presence, had seen with what dedication and sincerity he applied himself to every kind of task. One evening, as he left his home to go out for the evening prayers, he was greeted by the loud laughter of a group of children, laughter that was so joyous that it made him smile.

‘Bhai Budha,’ he said turning to his trusted disciple, ‘what is it that makes our children so loud in their happiness?’

‘Master, they have found a new playmate.’

The Guru nodded and said, ‘Yes, so I hear.’

The little group walked towards the central prayer area. By the time they came to where the children had been playing, the children had all gone. Lehna stood there by himself and as he saw the Guru approach he bowed low, waiting for him to pass. But the Guru did not pass by. He stood near Lehna and put his hand on Lehna’s head.

‘Who are you and from where do you come?’ Guru Nanak asked in a gentle voice.

For a moment Lehna stood there not daring to speak. The Guru had put his hand on his head, the Guru had addressed him. He felt such a deep joy that he was afraid to speak and thus break the spell. But the Guru waited and Lehna knew that he must answer.

‘I come from Khadur and my name is Lehna,’ he said, his voice so low it could hardly be heard.

‘Your Lehna, your debt, was here, with me, and that is why God has brought you to Kartarpur.’

The days slid quietly into months and the months into years and Lehna worked each day to pay his debt to the Guru by working with tireless devotion in the service of the sangat, the assembly of devotees and disciples. Each night, he went to bed happy in the thought that he had done the most that he could do, the best that he could do. He sought no reward, no special mark of affection from the Guru. Soon everyone in the community knew that he was special because of the special quality of his service and, in many small ways, the Guru also showed special marks of favour for his devoted follower.

Lehna had always shown consideration and love for his parents, his wife and his children. Even though he was away from them, he did not forget them. He wrote to his father as often as he could. Pheru had always known that his son was different from the sons of the other traders, because he had always found greater pleasure in giving than in receiving. So it did not come as a great surprise to him that his son now spent all his time in the service of others with no thought for himself. Khivi, too, knew that there was something special about her husband. She missed him and when his letters were read out to her, tears would come to her eyes. He was a good man, her husband, and what he was doing must be good. So like Sulakhni, Guru Nanak’s wife, before her, she prepared herself to wait out the time till her husband’s return.

Sometimes Pheru would accompany Jodha on his visits to Kartarpur to see how his son was faring. On these visits, Pheru listened to the Guru and was influenced by his teachings. Occasionally he invited his daughter-in-law to go with him and even though their stay in Kartarpur was limited to a few days, Khivi was happy to be with her husband again.

Lehna had been in Kartarpur for three years now, and it was an established fact that he was one of the Guru’s chosen disciples. One day, after the morning prayers, the Guru sent for Lehna.

‘You have paid your debt to me well,’ the Guru said, referring to their first conversation three years ago. ‘But there are other debts you still have to pay: the debt to your father, the debt to your wife and children. You must return to Khadur to settle your affairs.’

The story of Lehna’s service and of the favour he had received from the Guru had travelled to Khadur before him. When the news spread that Lehna had returned, all the people came out to greet him. There was love and affection for a good, kind man who had been away for three long years, but there was also respect for the man who had come so close to the master.

People came to him for advice and they also came to listen to his teachings, Guru Nanak’s teachings, and they joined him when he sang Guru Nanak’s hymns. Lehna spent this time in arranging his affairs and when he was sure that he had made sufficient provision for his father, his wife, and his children, he said goodbye and returned to Kartarpur.

He reached Kartarpur late in the evening and found that the Guru was still out in the fields. There were three bundles of freshly cut fodder that still lay in the field, waiting to be carried home. ‘I’ll send a servant to carry this as soon as I get home,’ Lakhmi Das said. However, Lehna didn’t wait and lifted the bundles onto his head, one upon the other, and made his way back through the fields. The fodder was wet, dripping wet and the muddy water flowed from his head down over his neck to his shirt and soon the shirt was covered with smudges. It was a beautiful shirt made of ‘boski’, soft Chinese silk that Khivi had bought from a travelling salesman who passed through the village. On the day of his return to Kartarpur, he had worn this special shirt. And here it was now, sticking to his back, soiled and dirty. But he did not notice this. He was happy to be performing a service for his Guru. It was Sulakhni who noticed the dirty shirt. The moment she saw Lehna approaching the house with the load of fodder on his head, she took Guru Nanak aside.

‘How could you do this?’ she asked. ‘How could you allow Lehna to carry this load and dirty his clothes with mud?’

‘When the mud comes from such willing and selfless service, it does not remain mud – it becomes saffron. And when the load of fodder is carried by Lehna it is no longer a load but the halo of God’s blessing,’ Guru Nanak said. Sulkahni looked at Lehna, so humble and meek, and then she looked at her proud and arrogant son and she knew the truth in Guru Nanak’s statement.

A few months later the monsoon broke in a strong, heavy rain. For hours on end the rain came down, heavy and strong. A report was brought to the Guru that one of the newly built walls in the dharamshala had given way, and the Guru hurried to see the extent of the damage. Part of a wall had indeed given way.

The Guru saw that if it was not attended to immediately, there was danger of the entire wall coming down, and the roof caving in.

‘Son, this must be attended to immediately,’ he said to Lakhmi Das.

‘Yes, father. But none of the masons could be found. Don’t worry father. I will find a mason and have it attended to first thing in the morning,’ Lakhmi Das assured his father, while stifling a yawn. The Guru did not say anything more and returned home. But Lehna slipped away quietly into the darkness and brought two labourers back with him. The mason was away on a visit to a neighbouring village and would not be back till the next morning. Lehna organized all the material – the bricks, lime, and sand for the mortar. Hour after hour he struggled through the night, rebuilding the wall as best as he could.

By the time the Guru stopped at the site on his way to morning prayers, the damaged part of the wall had been sufficiently built to avert any more danger to the building. Word of this incident spread through the community and it was clear to everyone that Lehna was the chosen one, and most people knew, without anything being said, that he would be the next Guru. But there were some who felt that Sri Chand, Nanak’s elder son, who was a very pious man, should be the next Guru. Sri Chand was not an ambitious man, but a particular group of disciples tried to poison his mind against Lehna.

Guru Nanak, in his wisdom, saw that he must act to keep the peace in Kartarpur. He called Lehna, Sri Chand, Lakhmi Das, Bhai Budha and his other senior disciples to him.

He addressed Lehna and said, ‘Bhai Lehna, you have shown over these long years that you are the flesh of my flesh and the blood of my blood. You are my angad, part of my ang, my body. Because you are my angad, you must continue the work that I have begun. Come Bhai Budha, come forward and apply saffron paste on Angad’s forehead,’ said Guru Nanak. Then he put five copper coins and a coconut at Lehna’s feet and bowed to him. Guru Nanak bowed to Lehna, and he was ordained as the second Guru of the Sikhs – Guru Angad Dev.

The Guru had appointed his successor during his lifetime to make sure that there would be no opposition to the Guru later on.

To avoid any trouble between Guru Angad and his sons, Guru Nanak decided that Guru Angad should go back to Khadur. Without his physical presence, the opposition to his anointment would slowly melt away. As always, Guru Angad bowed to his master’s wishes and returned to Khadur.

Guru Angad laid great importance on a proper education for children. Apart from studies, Guru Angad realized that children should also be physically strong, apart from being good at studies, and insisted that they should take part in sports. He asked their teachers to organize competitions and he himself gave away prizes to the winners. He said that physical fitness was necessary because you could only have a healthy mind if you had a healthy body.

Guru Angad was happy in Khadur, happy that he was able to bring the teachings of his Guru to the people. At the same time he missed his Guru very much and his deepest wish was that the Guru should send for him. Then, at last, the Guru did send for him and he returned to Kartarpur with joy in his heart. But the joy turned to sadness when he realized that his Guru was dying. He was with Guru Nanak when Guru Nanak breathed his last. Then he took leave of Mata Sulakhni and of Sri Chand and returned to Khadur. This is what his Guru had wanted him to do and he knew that this was the only way he could avoid any differences coming up between him and the Guru’s family.

At Khadur, he continued the Guru’s work. Some of Guru Nanak’s chief disciples, like Baba Budha, now came to Khadur to follow Guru Angad and they saw that the lamp Nanak had lit in Kartarpur now spread its glow in Khadur. Khadur now became the centre of the world for the Sikhs. Guru Angad realized that what held his followers together were the teachings of his Guru and these teachings had come to them in the form of Guru Nanak’s hymns. He began to collect all the hymns composed by Guru Nanak in order to set them down on paper. These hymns had all been composed in the language of the people, in Punjabi. Guru Angad felt that they could not be written in the Arabic script which was the script of the Quran, or in the Devnagri script, the script in which the holy books of the Hindus were written. Some historians suggest that he chose thirty-five suitable letters from different scripts and developed the Gurmukhi script in which he wrote Guru Nanak’s hymns. Others are of the opinion that the script was already in existence and Guru Angad only improved upon it. Guru Angad collected all his guru’s hymns and wrote them down in the new script. He made copies of this collection and gave them to each of the centres of the Sikhs, so that his followers could read these hymns and learn them by heart.

The Guru himself did not write as many hymns as Nanak, but the few shlokas he wrote are now a part of the Guru Granth Sahib.

At this time an old man by the name of Amar Das came and joined the sangat at Khadur. He had been a Vaishnav, but was in search of a Guru. He joined the community in Khadur and spent his life in the service of others.

Guru Angad took care to give all respect to Mata Sulakhni and to Sri Chand. He made frequent trips to Kartarpur to pay his respects. He did everything in his power for Sulakhni and for Sri Chand and in this way they too came to love and respect him. They refused to listen to those who tried to poison their minds against Guru Angad and thus the guru was able to avoid a split among Nanak’s followers.

Guru Angad had a very rich follower named Gobind, who was involved in a property dispute with his relatives. It was a very valuable piece of property and Gobind prayed silently to his Guru for help and promised that if he won the case, he would build a new town for his Guru. As luck would have it, Gobind did win the case and all the property became his. He was a true disciple and did not go back on his word. He came to the Guru for his blessings and asked for the Guru’s help to build the new township. The Guru could not leave Khadur, so he asked his favourite disciple, Amar Das, to go and supervise the building of the new township. So the town of Goindwal was built. Gobind built a beautiful haveli and once again came to his Guru and begged him to come and live in Goindwal. Since the Guru was not in a position to leave Khadur, he asked Amar Das to take up residence at Goindwal.

When Guru Angad had first brought the teachings of Guru Nanak to Khadur, he had run into opposition from a group of tapasvis (ascetics) who had set up a dera in Khadur. The chief of these was Shiv Nath. Shiv Nath had opposed Guru Angad in every way, but Guru Angad had quietly gone about his work and had soon gathered a large following. This made the tapasvis angry because they had been very powerful in the village, but now their followers were slowly deserting them and becoming the followers of Guru Angad. One year there was a severe drought in Khadur and the surrounding area. The people came to their Guru and begged for his help. ‘You are a man of God, and if you pray, God will grant your prayers,’ said the people. ‘It is the will of God, The rain will fall only when God decides that it must fall,’ the Guru said.

The villagers felt that the Guru could make the rain fall if he so wished and they were not happy with the Guru’s answer. Some of the older villagers remembered that when they had been the followers of the tapasvis, Shiv Nath had sometimes performed miracles for them. Now the villagers felt that the Guru having failed them, Shiv Nath might still be able to work a miracle and bring the life-giving rain to relieve them of their suffering. When he heard what they wanted, he taunted them saying, ‘So now that you are in trouble, you have remembered me. Go back to your Guru, whom you follow, and ask him to help you. Ask him to make the rain fall. Go.’

The villagers returned sadly to their homes. But the hot dry days continued. Those who could afford to move, left the village and went to live in other towns and villages. But most of the villagers could not afford to do this and were compelled to stay on in Khadur. Soon it was clear that unless the rain came soon, they would all die and they went again to Shiv Nath and fell at his feet and cried.

‘We are sorry, O tapasvi. Forgive us. We will never desert you again.’ The tapasvi thought he could now have his revenge on Guru Angad.

‘All right, I will help you. But there is one condition. You must drive this so-called Guru out of your village,’ said the tapasvi.

It was a difficult situation for the villagers. They had all been followers of the Guru and they all knew in their hearts that he was a great and pious man. How could they tell him to leave the village? But their suffering was great. They knew they knew that without the rain they faced certain death and they believed that Shiv Nath could work a miracle and make this happen. So, after a great deal of discussion, it was decided that a group of five would go and request the Guru to leave the village. But when they reached the dera, they came to know that the Guru had already left Khadur already and set up camp a few miles away after learning of their quandary. The villagers went back to Shiv Nath. He organized a great yagna and recited many special mantras. He took generous offerings from the villagers and performed all kinds of rites. He promised that the rain would fall the next day, but the next day came and went and there was no rain. The days stretched into weeks and still there was no rain and the villagers realized that Shiv Nath could not make the rains fall. They realized that their Guru had been right; no man could interfere with the will of God. They were all very ashamed of what they had done and they went to the Guru and begged forgiveness. As was to be expected, he forgave them readily and returned to Khadur. A few days later the rain came and the people went wild with joy.

Like Guru Nanak, Guru Angad knew that he must appoint his successor during his lifetime, so that there would be no trouble or dispute after his death. He announced that Amar Das would succeed him. Once again Baba Budha anointed the new Guru. Like Guru Nanak, Guru Angad also realized that his family was not happy with his choice, especially his son Datu, who had hoped to be the next Guru. To avoid any conflict between his family and Amar Das, he asked Amar Das to set up his dera in Goindwal. A few months later, surrounded by his devoted followers, Guru Angad breathed his last. The year was 1552 and Guru Angad was forty-eight-years old at the time.

Guru Angad remained the Guru of the Sikhs for thirteen years. During his tenure he set up many centres. He organized a system of collecting the offerings from each centre and then distributing them to the centres according to each centre’s need. In this way the expenses of running the langars and the schools, even by the smallest centres, could be met. He knew that if the children were given a good education and made sound of body and mind, they would have good all-round personalities and grow up to be very useful members of society. This is why he persuaded all Sikhs to send their children to school. He insisted that education must be in the children’s mother tongue, so that the children would have a sense of identity and would be proud of their heritage.

During his stewardship the new faith was strengthened and the following increased considerably.