Kabir notes
Kabir’s daughter and piplika shaastrarth,
जन कबीर का सिषर घर, बाट िलै ली िैल । पााँ त्र न सटकै पपीसलका, लोगसन लादे बैल
Ego must be kept aside when seeking knowledge, for reaching that height bookish knowledge will not
suffice
Kabir in hid=s didactic mood is very nasty, but when he talks of love, he invariably adopts a female
persona, sometimes he is reflective but then there’re udan maasis (upside down poems) true language
play
Kabir – I’m ram’s dog ?
Kabir did not want to be recognized as a poet, all his original manuscripts are lost, only those from
Punjab and rajasthan who wrote hi works have been transmitted, so we don’t really know about kabir’s
original poetic language
A poem is a poem when it creates a kind of movt in still waters, wave after wave, creative employment
of knowledge
मत पूछ के क्या हाल है मे रा तेरे पीछे , तू दे ख के क्या रं ग है तेरा मे रे आगे,
A great poet even in its private sentiments uses his words such that it echoes some universal sentiment
that lives beyond his times
ईमां मु झे रोके है जो खींचे है मुझे कुफ़्र ---- identity crisis at the hands of british eic, exposure to
काबा मे रे पीछे है कलीिा मेरे आगे --------new culture and the conflict imposed on them to
maintain their identity --ग़ासलब
Yaksha prashna- what is the most astounding thing? Yudhisthir- vasana for immortality-
Kabir-
Within a moment, the body withers, It is this why kabir composes poems (chin mei bithre
sarira, ih kaaran pad rache kabir)
Everybody relates to it, in most economical usage of words, so much provocation, the
achievement of kabir lies in the fact that all these feelings are conveyed merely in 9-12
words. Gives rise to some sort of resonance,
Kabir’s mother’s 2 fold complaint- kabir left trade for bhakti etc
Kabir practice vaishnavite rituals despite being muslim
Someone claiming to be absolutely original is a nut case, the originality lies in rearranging
the ideas and reconfiguring the influences
Kabir is essentially a poet of listening and singing, even today there;s a lot of kabir is outside
the manuscripts
Eg-one of the most iconic kabir songs isn’t found in any of the manuscripts-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNl_pK0u9-k
Oral trad is an ongoing devt,---rajasthani sufi singer---
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZFJVoEtaPU
Most recurrent words- vivek, ram , anbhaya, anubhav, shabad, jatan, anhad
Kabir’s critique of Hinduism and islam is for the organized form of religion and not a child
like annoyance against the religions, there is a deep philosophical reflection,
It is a typical modern disposition that no matter what you can’t despise someone by matter
of accident pf birth nor can you respect someone because they were born in upper caste and
bear with their impulses
Sarabjit came to challenge kabir in shaastrarth and ended up becoming is ardent disciple, is
known as the 1st acharya of kabir panthis- suraj gopal (?)
aate haiñ ġhaib se ye mazāmīñ ḳhayāl meñ ,
'ġhālib' sarīr-e-ḳhāma navā-e-sarosh hai - ghalib
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ordi4e72nVY------sunta hai guru gyani---kumar gandharva
the paradox of truth-laozi-the book of tao
“when I reach there He will have to seek forgiveness”- some prisoner at Auschwitz
Believing in God is not a reqt to follow a particular religion, Hinduism is peculiarly democratic as you can
choose your god, but you will be judged on the basis of your conduct not on the basis of your
compliance
KABIR GRANTHAVALI- authentic corpus of Kabir, based on manuscripts from Raj/Punjab, the term dharm
occurs rarely, but so far as bhakti is concerned, its concepts are very frequently occurring.
Howsoever you define dharm, Kabir was concerned about the practice
What is implied by total omission of the term dharm in kabir’s texts? What is bhakti in Kabir’s context?
Nastik- one who doesn’t believe in the authority of vedas
Samkhya – vedic school is considered astik despite no belief in god because they comply to the authority
of vedas
Eg- Naradi bhakti
CHEER HARAN EPISODE
न िा िभा यत्र न िन्ति वृद्ााः
वृद्ा न ते ये न वदन्ति धममम् |
धमो न वै यत्र च नान्ति ित्यम्
ितां न तद्यच्छलनानु सवद्म् ||
अर्म - वह् िभा वािव में िभा नहीं यसद उि में में अनुभवी वृद् जन उपन्तथर्त न हों ,और यसद
वृद् व्यन्ति दू िरों को धमाम चरण के सलये प्रेररत नहीं करता है तो वह् वृद् कहलाने के योग्य नहीं है | सजि
धमम में ित्याचरण को महत्व नहीं सदया जाता है वह् धमम ही नहीं है | वे व्यन्ति िज्जन नहीं हो िकते हैं जो छल कपट
की भावना िे ग्रि होते हैं |
Dharma is not stagnant, one has to constantly evolve the beliefs of dharma. Only Vidura and Vikarna
oppose the great injustice.
“BHAKTI is sharing and companionship, not surrender or worship”- explaining vedic etymology
The holy quran was read by khan abdul ghaffar khan and the same quran has today become the basis of
jihadist activities----interpretation makes all the difference----plus your interpretation is not your own
original interpretation as it is influenced by a priori knowledge and awareness
Religion-connection with faith in a particular correct way
Dharma- strictly ethical
Panini was the 1st person in the world to compose grammar, paniniashtadhyayi is the 1st doc on
grammar of Sanskrit, he defines bhakti as involvement, membership and loving sense of belonging-
which includes devotion as well. He didn’t create the language, he is just creating a grammar from the
soral language. Emotion involvement is the most imp. Characteristic of bhakti.
Patanjali underlines that language is essentially arbitrary, and there is no inherent characteristic of logic,
language is by definition a social construct,
With all the differences in humans, there is still some amount of universality
Raghusiddhant-Bhattoji dixit (?)
Ch-1 of Gita- arjun-vishad yog
िवमधमाम न्पररत्यज्य मामे कं शरणं व्रज।
अहं त्वा िवमपापेभ्यो मोक्षसयष्यासम मा शु चाः।
Etymologically dharma’s primary connotation is – the nature of something- pani ka dharma behna hai
From this is derived an ethical connotation- dharma defines the nature that SHOULD be- or the proper
conduct---eg- vidhyarthi ka dharm padhna hai
Kabir replaced dharma with bhakti in a single stroke, if one doesn’t live in accordance with bhakti then
there is no point of dharma
“truth is verifiable statement of a fact” (?)—philosophically- Truth is which we can’t ever fully discover,
for which there is constant search
Moses asked god to reveal himself and almost turned blind, maybe one can’t be ever exposed to the
whole truth.
NARAD BHAKTI SUTRA (100 sutras)
कलजु ग प्रर्म नामदे व भै या, सकशव अपने बि कर ले
Read: https://jagritinatyamanch.wordpress.com/2016/06/14/purushottam-agrawal-stands-with-jnu-
karwan-e-fikr/
Anantdas describes namdev as the pioneer of bhakti and kabir himself pays handsome tributes to
namdev and expresses gratitude.
Narad is in constant company of Vishnu in vaikunth, he is an archetypal bhakt,
Kabir deliberately identifies with narad sutras and not with shandilya sutras because, the latter
conforms to vedic authority atleast notionally. There is an acceptance of the scriptural framework.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akka_Mahadevi
The temple with the mirror##
The ideas of bhakti couldn’t be made concrete in indian minds due to the interruption of colonialism and
vernacular was reduced to a footnote
Chaitanya mahaprabhu imagined himself as a gopika
Gopikas and surdas conversation, gopis demolish uddhav’s ideas—
http://aaradhika.com/krishna/gopiyan-ke-mann-praan-netra-and-shree-krishna-prem/
https://books.google.co.in/books?id=Y3k8DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA26&lpg=PA26&dq=into+the+lion%27s+coa
t+rushes+a+goat+kabir&source=bl&ots=PVb5nTYhMv&sig=ACfU3U3neWmJY2mj4AzkbO8SmhhiP56UxA
&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjRncajkofkAhXt7HMBHef7CCEQ6AEwCXoECAgQAQ#v=onepage&q=into%2
0the%20lion's%20coat%20rushes%20a%20goat%20kabir&f=false
https://www.google.com/search?q=bhavbhuti+poet&spell=1&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwistKP9kYfkAhW97X
MBHdLlD-kQBQgsKAA&biw=1366&bih=657
http://harpreetkhera.blogspot.com/2010/05/mat-puch-ke-kya-hal-hai-mera-tere-piche.html
{dharm artha kaam moksha}
https://pearlsofspirituality.wordpress.com/2011/08/13/sant-kabir-ke-dohe-2/
kaam milaaye ram ko….
#sukhdev listned to bhagvat and narrated
In southern tradition- naamarva (?) articulate their love as if they are women
Sufi poetry outside india imagines divinity as female and the devotee as male, but unde indian influence
Sufism this tradition is reversed (eg- Amir Khusro)
There is a strong emotion of love between khusro and nizamuddin
गोरी िोवे िेज पर, मु ख पर डारे केि।
चल खु िरो घर आपने , िां झ भयी चहु दे ि।।
Love without physical union is not love---
https://www.purushottamagrawal.com/tag/kabir-2/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCMZwVXUUcc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbfmUaUH1gs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D75H3_knt7A
