Divine Bliss to Ardent Passion

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From Divine Bliss to Ardent Passion: Exploring Sikh Religious Aesthetics through the DhdGenreAuthor(s): Michael NijhawanSource: History of Religions, Vol. 42, No. 4 (May 2003), pp. 359-385Published by: The University of Chicago PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/378759 .

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Michael Nijhawan FR O M D I V I N E B LI SS

TO A R D EN T PA SSI O N :

EX PLO R I N G SI K H

R ELI G I O U S A ESTH ETI C S

THROUGH THE DhadiG E N R E

2003 by The University of Chicago. All rights reserved.0018-2710/2003/4204-0003$10.00

One of the distinctive features of Sikh religious practice is the variation

between meditative-mystical and heroic-passionate aesthetics, which in

their mutual relationship lend themselves differently to processes of po-

litical and social resignification. In this article I wish to explore some-thing of the background of this relationship as it is represented in the

discourses and practices associated with a popular performative genre of

Panjab called hai. Astonishingly, this genre has to date not receivedneeded scholarly attention, although it is firmly situated in the cultural

history of the region. The hai genre comprises crucial elements ofbardic song-recitation and in addition incorporates elements of devotional

music as well as oratorical forms of historical narration. As an interest-

ing issue we might note that the social stratum from which the perform-

ers called hais have emerged was very flexible in its association withthe major religious traditions of Panjab. As pointed out by scholars like

Mark Juergensmeyer and Harjot S. Oberoi, until the late nineteenth

Field research in Panjab in 1999 and 2000 was funded by the Cusanuswerk Bonn. I amgrateful to Roma Chatterji, Vasudha Dalmia, Martin Fuchs, William Sax, KhushwantSingh Khushi, Shobna Nijhawan, and the reviewers ofHistory of Religions for comment-ing on earlier drafts of this article. I would also like to thank Prem Singh, the Sikh Mis-sionary College, and the members of the Guru Hargobind Dhadi Sabha for their generosityin sharing their thoughts and experiences, without which this article could not have been

written.


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Sikh Religious Aesthetics360

century bardic groups in Panjab could hardly be labeled by attributing

to them unified identity markers of Sikh, Hindu, or Muslim origin, which

is certainly more accurate in respect to the present situation, as a major-

ity of the performers are members of the Sikh panth.1In the course ofconducting anthropological fieldwork, I have encountered hais in re-ligious and secular gatherings, primarily at the occasion of cultural fes-

tivals (mele), commemorative festivals at Sikh and Sufi shrines, and

frequently during daily liturgical services of the Sikhs. They are singers,

forming a group of three musicians consisting of two drum (ha)players and a player of a stringed instrument called saragi. In the Sikhtradition a fourth member accompanies the musicians, performing ora-

tory in the form of historical narration (itihasak prasaga) about the Sikh

gurus and historical martyrs. Since the late seventeenth and early eigh-teenth centuries, this genre provides the representational media through

which the lives and deeds of past heroes, religious figures, and more

recent figures of Panjabs history are remembered. Patronized under the

umbrella of the Akal Takht and thus representing Sikh worldly power,

the hai genre has retained a language and aesthetics of martyrdom,suffering, and violence, which in its modern, twentieth-century form

has emerged as an agent of collective Sikh self-definition and political

mobilization.

Let me begin with an observation that is directly related to the recentassociation of the haigenre with the rise of militancy and Sikh ethno-nationalism in the 1980s.2 By the time I started ethnographic research,

the militant movement had ebbed, yet the memory that linked the pas-

sionate voice of hai singers with the violence and suffering of the1980s was still vivid.3 We might note here as an intriguing fact that this

relationship has been mediated by a discourse on the efficacy of the fe-

male voice. The recognition of the female voice as such was not entirely

new. For a long time the voice of the saragiwithout question the cen-

tral idiom of hai performancehas been associated with the female

1 Mark Juergensmeyer, Religion as Social Vision (Berkeley: University of CaliforniaPress, 1982); and Harjot Oberoi, The Construction of Religious Boundaries: Culture, Iden-tity, and Diversity in the Sikh Tradition (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1997). A full dis-cussion of how genre, community, and religion are related in the Panjab is beyond thescope of this article. For a broader perspective, see Michael Nijhawan, Dhadi DarbarReligion, Violence, Agency, and Their Historicity in a Panjabi Performative Genre (doc-toral thesis, Heidelberg University, 2002).

2 For the term ethnonationalism, see Gurharpal Singh,Ethnic Conflict in India: A CaseStudy of Punjab (London: Macmillan, 2000).

3 Michael Nijhawan, Rhetorik, Musik, und Reprsentationspraxis in Panjabs Dhadi-Genre, in Moderne Oralitt, ed. Ingo W. Schrder and Stphane Voell (Marburg: Curu-pira, 2002). For a discussion of diasporic hai songs that represent the ideology of theKhalistan movement, see Joyce Pettigrew, Songs of the Sikh Resistance Movement,Asian

Music 23 (Fall/Winter 1992): 85118.


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History of Religions 361

voice of longing and lament.4 In the recent context of political violence,

however, a different principle of the invigorating female voice was given

expression. It happened in a way that allowed women performers to enter

the male-dominated tradition.5 Women performers first appeared on thescene immediately before the Indian army launched their attack on the

Akal Takht in Amritsar. A group of women performers known as the na-bhewale bibiam started to perform heroic songs in the vicinity of thetemple complex. The contemporary performers with whom I worked em-

phasized that the bibiams high pitch of voice was deemed appropriate toarouse fervent passion (jo), the expression of extreme agony, and thespirit of resistance.

In 1999, I had a series of conversations with female singers and musi-

cians, recent converts to Sikhism, whose motivation to perform the haigenre has to be understood against the background of this entanglement

of performative voice with political violence. At one point I asked Pa-

wandeep Kaur, leader of ahaigroup and one of my fieldwork inter-locutors, why she was attracted to perform the heroic songs of Sikh

martyrs, although all evidence suggested that, more than a decade after

the turmoil, it could still be potentially harmful to bear the name hai.Counterinsurgency measures of the state were occasionally directed

against those taking an active role in commemorative functions. Her an-

swer was:

We do this to gain a state of inner peace [assiapne man diantivaste kardeham]. It is good for us and there will be no tension. We will not incite ten-sion. We shall neither incite tension nor shall somebody bother us. Brother,

nothing wrong will happen to us. Brother, should we suffer pain, we will face

it with honor, with our parents honor, with the honor of our brothers and sis-

ters we shall continuethats all [bhai, jitthe unha numez pahumce, assiunhadileke izzat, ma-piu diizzat, bhain-bhare diizzat le ke turan, bas].

Borrowing the English term tension that has perpetuated public dis-

course during the last two decades or so, Pawandeep Kaur discarded my

4 As pointed out by Regula Qureshi, the saragiembodies ambivalent memories that arelinked with courtesan culture. See Regula Qureshi, How Does Music Mean? EmbodiedMemories and the Politics of Affect in the Indian Sarangi,American Ethnologist27, no. 4(2000): 80538. A full exploration of how the materiality of the saragisignifies voice pro-duction and functions as a site of alterity for the haiperformers is beyond the scope ofthis article.

5 The emergence of female hais occurred at a time when their male colleagues, with

their orthodox outer appearance, were directly confronted with censorship by the state.In performing this genre one had to deal with these hazards of public speech. However, Iwould not consider the emergence of female performers as the direct consequence of suchrestrictions. Rather, as I have pointed out, the reassessment of the heroic voice providesthe parameters by which the actual appearance of female singers is acknowledged.


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idea that her haiperformance would be an expression of militancy orwould spur the use of violence. Tension is something that has to be

avoided by all means. Tension is what she had known for all too long. It

has been a prevalent condition in her life and a political condition underwhich her performative profession had become subject to general sus-

picion. Instead, the performance of haiwould lead to the release oftension.

Beyond the immediate context of violence, the rendering of aesthetic

experience is related to the self-understanding of the performers as re-

sponsible public and pious actors. What is needed, says Pawandeep Kaur,

is the obligation (firz) and responsibility (jummewari ) of performing be-fore an audience; as another performer stated it, what is presented on

the stage must contribute to the Sikh communitys well-being [succajjisehat] and progress [sucaru sehat]. This is different from any bad con-duct that is without soul, without recognition (sirah), without meaning[literally without head and feet, be sir-pair]. In the contemporary con-

text in which Sikh haiperformers begin to reorganize their social net-work by dissociating themselves from corrupt patrons and a recent history

of militancy and suffering, it comes as no surprise that they emphasize

issues of reputation, social responsibility, and piety in clear distinction

from bad politics. Thus, on the one hand, Pawandeep Kaurs rendering

of the haigenre as a religious way of life resonates with the agenda ofan entire performative community.6 On the other hand, she tells us some-

thing about the internal processes of how female actors gain reputation in

a male-dominated performative community.7

6 The performers of the Malwa region with whom I worked have recently formed an asso-ciation (haisabha) in order to put forward their claims on a political platform. Leavingaside a few celebrated performers, Sikh hais are currently not granted sufficient recog-nition. The average amount of money ajatha receives at a major festival occasion is be-tween 200 and 800 Indian rupees that have to be shared among the four members of ateam. At historic gurdware, where Sikh hais perform on Sundays, they mostly earn sig-nificantly less, sometimes merely enough to pay travel expenses. At the same time, the ha-is are aware that popular preachers (pracarakand granthis) and kirtan performers (ragis)receive a much larger amount of money and public attention, no matter how well they per-form. Some of the claims brought forward against the patrons and Sikh institutions are di-rected against this obvious gap.

7 For the notion of reputation, see Julian Gerstin, Reputation in a Musical Scene: TheEveryday Context of Connections between Music, Identity, and Politics,Ethnomusicology42, no. 3 (1998): 385414. According to Gerstin, reputation alludes to the actual processesof internal hierarchization in a musical scene. Gerstin has studied the ways in which repu-tation is constructed in a performative community. These processes are not accidental tothe social identity of musicians but are among the key sites in which questions of aesthetics,competence, and social identity are constantly reworked and concretely related to performa-

tive practice (ibid., p. 397). Without being able to explore this issue further here, I argue thatfor the haiperformers, reputation alludes to a broader notion of social recognition. As aperformative community, the members of the haisabha articulate their common ground interms of religious discourse, by which they also hope to transcend the micropolitics oper-ating in their own networks.


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Pawandeep Kaurs evaluation of performative aesthetics, however,

appears to have further implications. The process in which she links self,

performative community, and religious tradition cannot be explained

entirely in terms of discursive constructions, although, of course, it isthrough language that these issues are made accessible and intelligible.

Pawandeep Kaurs statement is set against the background of a nondis-

cursive idiom: the mood of stillness and the release of tension. In Sikh-

ism, the process of forming the self in terms of religious piety is usually

linked to the practical efforts of reciting, singing, and listening to the

hymns of theAdi Granth in the form of the meditative kirtan ritual. Kir-tan is considered to be absolutely central, as it elucidates the devotees

constant active engagement with, and enactment of, the sacred text. As

attested by Pawandeep Kaur and several other performers I have workedwith, the meditative idiom and mood of Sikh kirtan is employed here to

reinterpret the passionate-interpretive form and performative aesthetics

of the haigenre in the aftermath of political violence in Panjab. As Ishall further explore, such reinterpretations of performative practice and

aesthetics have significant ramifications for our understanding of reli-

gious practices in the Sikh tradition and beyond.

Anthropologists have drawn attention to the various musical and po-

etical forms in both liturgy-centered and performance-centered rituals.

Music, in particular, has been considered essential to practices of reli-gious experience and self-definition.8 It is said to engender a sense of

wholeness and transcendence. The sequencing and patterning of musical

performance serves to structure ritual time and set it apart from ordi-

nary time, as can be witnessed, for instance, in the Sufi qawwali ritual.9

Music intensifies the emotional attachment to particular places and moral

communities in a persuasive and focused manner. The frequent employ-

ment of poetical and musical genres in the religions of north India indi-

cates that people link themselves with religious tradition not merely by

the attraction to the doctrines of a particular faith, but because religioustradition is transmitted in a variety of performative repertoires and aes-

thetic forms through which the self is shaped spiritually and ethically.

There is sufficient evidence to suggest that what was for a long time

deemed a mere entertaining or supplementary form of expressive culture

has in fact been instrumental to the various ways in which subjectivity and

agency are constituted in religious practices. Such reevaluations of per-

formativity and musicality have certainly contributed to a reconsideration

8 For the north Indian context, see, in particular, John Leavitt, ed., Poetry and Prophecy:The Anthropology of Inspiration (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1997), andRegula Qureshi, Sufi Music of India and Pakistan: Sound, Context, and Meaning in Qaw-wali (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986).

9 Qureshi, Sufi Music, p. 141.


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of dominant scholarly frameworks on religious tradition. Thus, A. K.

Ramanujan, in his work on Indian folklore and literature, has pointed out

that Western scholarly approaches to Indian cultural and religious tradi-

tions have a tendency to omit the complex structure of performativepractices. For a long time, Western approaches were preoccupied with a

context-free hermeneutic analysis that would not lend itself to context-

sensitive forms of cultural practice and narrative tradition. Regarding

the plural framework of Indian narrative traditions, which are often part

and parcel of religious rituals, he has emphasized that no Indian text

comes without a context, a frame, till the nineteenth century. Rather, we

find clear instructions that tell the reader, reciter or listener all the good

that will result from his act of reading, reciting or listening.10 Recently,

historians of religions have reemphasized this line of thought. The deis-tic model of religiosity in particular, based on a clear distinction between

arts as the domain of (secular) aesthetics and the essence of religion to be

accessed by natural reason, has become subject to extensive criticism. As

Donna Wulff has argued, Western students of religion continue to focus

largely on the discursive symbols of theology and philosophy rather than

on the presentational symbols of music, drama, and the visual arts.11 In

a similar vein, Navid Kermani has pointed out that the relatively clear

separation between art and religion in the Western mind . . . is rather the

exception, and one is tempted to turn the discussion of the aesthetic di-mension of the Quran into the question of why this dimension is largely

lost in the Western image of religion.12 Wulff and Kermani defy the

idea that religion is primarily accessible through its rational doctrines. At

the same time, no attempt is being made to return to European romanti-

cist notions of a presumably universal religious (mystical) core in the di-

versity of religion, which, as lucidly shown by Grace Jantzen, had been

a current in post-Enlightenment thinking from Schleiermacher to Will-

iam James.13

In this article I would like to pursue a somewhat different line ofthought by shifting the emphasis from the debate over religious herme-

neutics to an investigation of religious aesthetics as a sphere of practical

engagement through which we might better understand the historical

transitions taking place within religious and performative traditions them-

10 A. K. Ramanujan, Is There an Indian Way of Thinking? in The Collected Essays ofA. K. Ramanujan, ed. Vijay Dharwadker (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press,1999), pp. 3451.

11 Donna M. Wulff, Religion in a New Mode: The Convergence of the Aesthetic and

the Religious in Medieval India,Journal of the American Academy of Religions 54, no. 4(1986): 673.

12 Navid Kermani, Revelation in Its Aesthetic Dimension, in The Quran as Text, ed.Stefan Wild (Leiden: Brill, 1996), p. 221.

13 Grace M. Jantzen, Mysticism and Experience,Religious Studies 25 (1989): 296315,and Could There Be a Mystical Core of Religion? Religious Studies 26 (1990): 5971.


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selves. As my introductory example illustrates, it is not sufficient to con-

front hermeneutical and performative concepts in their applicability to

non-Western forms of religion. Anthropologically speaking, the issue has

to do with the culturally situated practices and discourses in which therelationship between religion and aesthetics is recognized and reevalu-

ated by social actors. To take this issue seriously, I suggest, we should

not lose sight of the fact that practitioners can and often do make clear

distinctions between the ineffable mystical experience of the divine and

aesthetic experience. The important fact is that we find an ongoing de-

bate on the necessity and legitimacy of such distinctions, which are fre-

quently drawn within the same registers of art, poetry, and music (as, for

instance, between sacred and secular poetry in Islam).

In this regard, there is a common feature in my argument with AnnaM. Gades work on the tradition of Quranic recitation in Indonesia, which

concerns the idea of critical self-measurements against commonly held

ideals of religious musicality.14 Gade proposes conceptualizing religious

musicality as a key site for understanding how social actors internalize

religious structure, enactments of religious musicality thus offering par-

ticularly accessible, audible points of reference for apprehending changes

in religious self and system, as well as the interactions of these do-

mains.15 Gade has focused on how the self is measured against the back-

ground of nondiscursive ideals of voice, talent, and taste, which I thinkaccounts for the possible ways in which a performative tradition can be-

come a site of alterity. Thus, for instance, Pawandeep Kaurs reassess-

ment of the meditative mood of kirtan in the passionate haivoice isa translation of the new sense of self, attained through musical and re-

ligious training. This is appraised in terms of gaining self-respect and

honor distinct from a personal past of vulnerability and poverty.

My interest in this article, however, is not with the social psychology

of this process but rather with the relationship between performative aes-

thetics and their historical and social conditions of possibility. I arguebelow that the assessment of the haigenre in terms of religious aes-thetics can be reiterated as a struggle with the dissonant memories that

are inherited in the practices associated with the name hai. Thus, theterm haiis incorporated in the Sikh scriptures as a concept of mysticalcommunication with the divine. Sikh hagiography, in contrast, provides a

different notion of how haiand religious aesthetics are related by sig-nifying haias a recognizable performative tradition in terms of Sikhpatronage. This in turn places the relationship between performative voice

and sacred sound on a different level. As I will show, the transitions

14 Anna M. Gade, Taste, Talent, and the Problem of Internalization: A Quranic Study inReligious Musicality from Southeast Asia,History of Religions 41, no. 4 (2002): 32868.

15 Ibid., p. 330.


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between these two orientations serve to problematize the notion of other-

ness of contemporary haiperformers. Yet at the same time, and underparticular historical circumstances such as existed during the 1980s, they

allow for a kind of social resignification through performative aesthetics,as indicated in the statement of Pawandeep Kaur introduced above.16

Dhadiin the early sikh traditionthe mystical dimension

Ardasi suni datari prabhi hahi kau mahil bulawaiPrabh dekhdia dukh bhukh gaihahi kau mangnu citi naavai

(Sri Adi Granth Sahib, Rag Maru,Mahla 5, Pauri, Panna 1097)

[God, the great giver, hears the prayer, and summons the

minstrel to the mansion of his presence

Gazing upon God, the minstrel is rid of pain and hunger;

he does not think to ask for anything else.]17

The mystical meaning of the name haican best be appraised by situ-ating it within Sikh cosmology and the social vision of the early Sikh tra-

dition. Let me remind the reader of the most basic principles of Sikhism:

it is a monotheistic religion in which God (Adi Purakh) is regarded asomnipresent and as the creator of the universe. This is already expressedin the compositions of Guru Nanak (14691539), whom Sikhs conceive

as the founding father of their religion, and all the following historical

gurus confirm it. God is regarded as immanent and transcendent at the

same time. He revealed himself to mankind in the form and teachings of

the historical Sikh gurus.18 Their hymns are compiled in a sacred book

called the Adi Granth (or Guru Granth Sahib), to which Sikh religionassigns the highest authority. In fact, it is itself regarded as the manifes-

16 My argument on how differently the Sikh tradition authorizes the haigenre doesnot entail a value judgment on either Sikhism or hai in terms of a coherent tradition inhistorical perspective. As will become sufficiently evident in the course of my discussion,we deal here with a category of social praxis and interaction (distinctions and interpretativeefforts made by various actors).

17 I have indicated the original section and pages according to the Guru Granth Sahib.The translation is taken from Sant Singh Khalsa, Sri Guru Granth Sahib, with revised trans-lation (Santa Ana: Sikh Center of Orange County, 1995 [CD-ROM]).

18 For a discussion of the Sikh belief system, see J. S. Grewal, Contesting Interpretationsof the Sikh Tradition (Delhi: Manohar, 1998); Niharranjan Ray, The Sikh Gurus and the SikhSociety: A Study in Social Analysis (Patiala: Punjabi University Press, 1970); Daljeet Singh

and Kharak Singh, eds., Sikhism: Its Philosophy and History (Chandigarh: Institute of SikhStudies, 1997); J. P. S. Uberoi, Religion, Civil Society, and the State: A Study of Sikhism(Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999). The canonization of theAdi Granth is expansivelydiscussed in Gurinder Singh Mann, The Making of Sikh Scriptures (Oxford: Oxford Uni-versity Press, 2001).

208.53


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tation of the guru and is accordingly treated as the central element around

which Sikh liturgical rituals are organized. TheAdi Granth is consideredunchangeable in its form and character, and Sikhs find in it the basics of

their faith. According to the hymns of the Adi Granth, the world cameinto existence by divine order (hukam). The hymns describe a religious

path that follows neither Hindu nor Muslim practice and custom. The

gurus insist on the rejection of all ritualistic or ascetic practices as a means

of salvation. The emphasis is on truthful living that follows an ethical

code (rahit), which entails an active engagement with society and human-

ity. The worldly orientation of the householder is regarded as a prerequi-

site rather than a hindrance to salvation in Sikhism.

In some of the hymns in theAdi Granth, to which I shall now turn, the

gurus refer to themselves as hais (hahi). The first reference to haiappears as the last stanza of the tenth composition, Rag Majh, in avarcomposed by Guru Nanak. We find here that the name mediates mystical

communication with God and the core concepts of the Sikh faith:

Hau hahi vekaru karai laiaRati dihai kai var dhurhu phurmaiahahi sacai mahali khasami bulaiaSaci siphati malah kapra paia

Saca amrit namu bhojanu aiaGurmati khadha raji tini sukhu paiahahi kare pasau sabadu vajaiaNanak sacu salahi pura paia

(SriAdi Granth Sahib, Rag Majh,Mahala 1, Pauri, Panna 1501)

[I was a minstrel, out of work, when the Lord took me into His service.

To sing His Praises day and night, He gave me His Order, right from the start.

My Lord and Master has summoned me, His minstrel, to the True Mansion of

His Presence.

He has dressed me in the robes of His True Praise and Glory.

The Ambrosial Nectar of the True Name has become my food.

Those who follow the Gurus Teachings, who eat this food and are satisfied,

find peace.

His minstrel spreads His Glory, singing and vibrating the Word of His Shabad.

O Nanak, praising the True Lord, I have obtained His Perfection.]

In these words, Guru Nanak expresses his belief that he was bestowed

with divine insight and that he had been chosen by God to sing his sacredhymns. The name hai has a truly spiritual meaning in this context.Used as an epithet in Nanaks hymns, it is at the same time an expression

of the devotional prayer and graceful calling of Gods name.


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It is important to note that the verses of the Adi Granth are hymns;they are sung and memorialized by the devotees in the form of different

ragas. In fact, the very spiritual meaning of these hymns can hardly be

thought of as existing separate from the music-poetical forms, in the sensethat the latter would constitute an aesthetic supplement to the actual

meaning of the narrative content. The emphasis on music and poetic

form is expressed in the structure of theAdi Granth as a whole. The bookis divided into thirty-one subsections, each of which is attributed to a

particular raga, beginning with SriRaga. This indicates that the his-torical gurus were trained in classical north Indian music. They con-

sciously chose complex musical structures to transmit divine messages.19

Sonic form itself was regarded as sacred, and listening to sacred sound as

transcendental. In contemporary Sikh liturgy, these hymns are recited inthe kirtan or abad-kirtanthe central devotional practice of Sikhism. Itis a form of meditation that consists of singing and listening to the

hymns of theAdi Granth in a congregational setting. In kirtan, the gurushymns gain their full evocative power in the aesthetic experience of sing-

ers and listeners. Similar to the Islamic tradition (as, e.g., indicated in the

debate on correct listening in the Sufi sama), there are certain prescrip-tions and codes of conduct as to how the hymns are to be heard and

recited. Ideally, the mind has to be purified from the desires and interests

of everyday life in order to guarantee a correct execution of the kirtan.Pious Sikhs will only recite and listen to the poetic hymns of the AdiGranth in a devotional posture and with proper attire. This attitude is

symbolized in practices such as cleaning hands and feet before entering

the precinct of the gurdwara and keeping the head covered before thesacred scripture, which after all is also considered to be the residence of

the guru. Such prescriptions guarantee a clear boundary drawn between

the pleasure taken in secular poetry (or music) and the religious aesthet-

ics evoked through listening to the hymns of the Adi Granth. Unlike in

the Islamic tradition, however, where the doctrine excludes any form ofinstrumental music during prayer times, Sikh kirtan has always been per-

formed to the accompaniment of string and drum instruments.20 Some

historical examples of instruments used for the kirtan include the taus,

19 Sher Singh Sher, Contribution of Sikh Gurus to Indian Musicology, in CurrentThoughts on Sikhism, ed. Kharak Singh (Chandigarh: Institute of Sikh Studies, 1996),pp. 31927. According to Sher, these ragas represent all basic seasonal and temporalmoods of the classical Indian raga. Sher Singh also points out the Sikh gurus preference

for string instruments. Thus, the sarinda (the predecessor of the sarangi ) is attributed toGuru Arjan (ibid., p. 323).

20 The Sufi qawwali is certainly an exception, yet as a form of ritual practice it is alsoclearly distinguished from Muslim prayer and never falls into prayer times.

One Line Short


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sarinda, and jori-pakhawaj. In modern times, the harmonium and thetabla have occupied their place.21

The importance attributed to sound also accords with the religious prac-

tices and teachings that characterized the north Indian saint-poets. Someof these compositions were even authorized by the Sikh gurus and later

included in the final canon of the Guru Granth Sahib. In one of these

verses, Kabir, the famous saint-poet, says:

By union of the ardent seeker and the enlightened Teacher

Comes about success in unison and devotion to God.

People consider my poems as songs,

Know these are meditations on the Divine.

Holy as the liberating sermon in Kashi at the time of deathWhoever chants or listens to the Name Divine with devoted heart

Saith Kabir, without doubt shall attain the supreme.22

The inclusion of Kabir and other saint-poets hymns indicates that the re-

ligious aesthetics of the early Sikh tradition shared important elements

with the sant tradition of medieval Panjab. This does not agree with a

current view, according to which Nanaks religion was simply another

form ofnirguna bhakti, which for many Sikhs entails a crucial misunder-

standing of the uniqueness and self-constitutive character of Sikh re-ligion.23 For the purpose of the argument outlined here, it is sufficient to

say that the historic Sikh gurus lived in a wider cultural and religious

framework to which the use of vernacular musical-poetical forms as a

medium of religious aesthetics was germane. To the extent that the Sikh

gurus have withdrawn from seeing the divine in iconic representations

21 I am grateful to Bhai Baldeep Singh for sharing his insights into the history of instru-mentation and religious musicality in the Sikh tradition.

22 SriAdi Granth Sahib, Rag Gauri, Ashtpadi. This translation is taken from GurbachanSingh Talib, Sri Guru Granth Sahib (Patiala: Patiala University Press, 1984), p. 335. For adiscussion of Kabirs religion, see Charlotte Vaudeville, Kabir and Interior Religion,His-tory of Religions 3, no. 2 (1964): 191201.

23 Kabir, Nanak, and Dadu are often named in the same breath as the influential sants (orpoet-saints) in medieval north India. See, e.g., Karine Schomer and W. H. McLeod, eds.,The Sants: Studies in a Devotional Tradition of India (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidas, 1987).Hew McLeod has proposed that the early Sikh tradition had been merely another versionof the santmovement. This idea has had a significant impact on how Western academiaconceptualizes Sikhism and has in turn been criticized by a variety of Sikh scholars. Whilemany of the arguments against McLeod were polemical in character, J. S. Grewal, amongothers, has pointed out that McLeod has failed to acknowledge crucial differences between

Nanak and other santsdifferences that in the case of Nanaks thought were decisive in ex-plaining the self-constitutive force of the Sikh tradition. Existing cleavages in Sikh scholar-ship notwithstanding, most historians would certainly agree that there was a shared commonground in the teachings of Kabir, Dadu, and Nanak.


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(the Hindu notion of daran), they have revitalized the sacred meaningof sound. Musical congregations have been a predominant way of wor-

ship since the inception of Sikh religion. The belief that one could reach

a new threshold of religio-aesthetic experience by performing a purelyric in the kirtan has been a main focus of Sikh ritual practice up until

today.24 We can link this shared emphasis of the Sikh gurus and bhaktas

on aesthetic praxis and reception of divine sound to a shared notion of

Indian aesthetics as indicated in the concept ofrasa, of which I will have

more to say below. There is a clear emphasis on experiencing the divine

messages through their mood, taste, or tone of voice. Particularly in ref-

erence to Guru Ram Das (guruship: 157481), commentators have put

emphasis on the fact that for the early Sikh community (as is true for the

contemporary Sikh panth) the focus of devotional activities was not onthe text in its abstract meaning (though the written word was important)

but on the liturgical-musical praxis of evoking the divine Name.25 The

divine Name can be reflected upon in all its aspects (nam simaran), andit seems the compilers of the Sikh holy book systematized this insight in

a musical architecture that provided the text with its final form as bani,which at the same time expresses the idea of text as an aesthetic object

and as a site of constant practical engagement.26

It is in this framework of sacred sound and religious aesthetics that we

can locate the mystical meaning of the term haiin the Sikh tradition inits generic dimension. For Guru Nanak as well as for his successors, the

liberation of mankind lay in inward meditation in the service of the

True Lordhaiis the minstrel divine engaged in exactly this devo-tional practice.

24 According to Bhai Baldeep Singh, shabad kirtan requires a perceptual awareness ofthe tradition ofkirtan maryada as it developed right from the times of the Gurus. This would

mean a clear understanding not only of the raga forms but also of the classical folk formsused in kirtan . . . [as] indicated in the Sri Guru Granth Sahib. With changing times thesefundamental forms have been polluted and tampered with. For example, there are 22 vaars(odes) in the Guru Granth Sahib but it is a pity that only asa-di-vaaris recited today. The sing-ing of these compositions was phenomenal as was the style of accompaniment on the per-cussive instruments. There were different rhythmic patterns played with each vaar. Theenormous challenge that we face today is to recover and restore the original forms of thesecompositions as authenticated by the great bards of the Gurdarbar. Bhai Baldeep Singh,The Tradition of Kirtan and Its Discipline, in Perspectives on Sikhism, ed. Prithipal SinghKapur and Dharam Singh (Patiala: Punjabi University Publication Bureau, 2001), p. 155.For more information on the genre of the var, see n. 33 below.

25 Gobind Singh Mansukhani, A Survey of the Poetry and Music of Guru Ram Das,

Journal of Sikh Studies 11, no. 2 (1984): 6686.26 Balbinder Bhogal, On the Hermeneutics of Sikh Thought and Praxis, in Sikh Reli-

gion, Culture, and Ethnicity, ed. Christopher Shackle, Gurharpal Singh, and Arvind PalSingh Mandair (London: Curzon, 2001), p. 88.

One Line Short


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hahi tis no akhiai ji khasmai dhare piaruDari khara seva gur sabadi vicaruhahi daru gharu paisi sacu rakhai ur dhari

hahi ka mahalu agala hari kai nai piarihahi ki seva cakari hari japi hari nimatari

(SriAdi Granth Sahib, Gujari ki Var,Mahala 3, Pauri, Panna 5165)

[He alone is called a minstrel, who enshrines love for his Lord and Master.

Standing at the Lords Door, he serves the Lord, and reflects upon the

Word of the Gurus Shabad.

The minstrel attains the Lords Gate and Mansion, and he keeps the

True Lord clasped to his heart.

The status of the minstrel is exalted; he loves the Name of the Lord.The service of the minstrel is to meditate on the Lord; he is emancipated

by the Lord.]

It needs to be remembered at this point in the discussion that Sikhism is

not embedded in an entire belief system of mysticism or asceticism. As

already mentioned, the practice of meditation and congregational singing

in Sikhism is complemented by an equally strong commitment to the

specific conduct of a social and pious life. Unlike nath (yogi) or certain

ascetic Sufi traditions, which stress inward meditation and the rejectionof outward forms, Sikh religion places an emphasis on the accomplish-

ment of religious truth by associating oneself with the saintly community

(sadh-sangat) of devotees. Everyday conduct and social service in the

community are therefore absolutely essential. Sikh belief and practice

also reject any idea of mysticism according to which disciples would re-

quire a spiritual guide in the form of another human agent without whom

the objectives of prayer and meditation could not be achieved. The cen-

tral focus in Sikh religion is the mystical meaning of scripture in its in-

tellectual and aesthetic experience, evoked by means of meditating on,singing of, and listening to the sacred hymns. The emphasis on the in-

timate experience of God is mystical to the extent that interior commu-

nication with the divine is based on the concept of a path of love,

which in turn is not private and individualistic but, similar to what Grace

Jantzen has found in her study of two paradigmatic cases of the Christian

mystical tradition, quintessentially communal, public, and indeed poli-

tical in its interconnections with integrity and justice.27

These political underpinnings of religious aesthetics and concepts of

Sikh mysticism in fact have direct importance for my discussion of the

27 Jantzen, Mystical Core (n. 13 above), p. 71.


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Two Lines Short

hai genre. The name hai was employed in the sacred hymns notmerely by poetic convention but presumably also by conscious choice,

in order to express the social vision of Sikh religion: the ordinariness

and equality of all human beings in relation to the supreme Lord.28 TheSikh gurus could not have missed the fact that the name haiwas asso-ciated with a group of bards that ranked at the lower end of the social

hierarchy. Although we must be careful not to project the negative social

image of musicians of later periods upon the situation in sixteenth- and

seventeenth-century Panjab, it is very likely that bards were associated

with service castes, and thus were regarded as low and dependent on the

patronage of powerful rulers, chiefs, and families. The increasing number

of hymns in which the term hai(hahi) appears is traceable in Guru

Ram Dass compositions. As a matter of fact, this corresponds with theperiod in which many low-caste groups are believed to have joined the

emerging Sikh community. The original Sikh community in Kartarpur

that gathered around Nanak was already egalitarian in appearance, based

on a rejection of caste and gender inequalities that were explicitly trans-

gressed in the form of sharing of food or by means of congregational

worship. This orientation toward social equality and everyday life was

further developed during the time of Nanaks successors Guru Angad,

Guru Amar Das, and Guru Ram Das. Guru Amar Das (guruship: 1552

74), for instance, established the manjispositions held by appointedSikhs who were given the task of education and handling of community

affairs.29 During this early period of the institutionalization of Sikh reli-

gion, the community increased and central institutions such as the com-

munity kitchen (lagar), code of conduct (rahit maryada), and a revenuesystem (das vand) for the benefit of the underprivileged and for the

maintenance of the gurdwara were established. Followers of the Sikhswere streaming in from all spheres of social life; however, because of the

rejection of caste inequalities, there existed a special appeal for low-

caste groups, which are said to have venerated the Sikh gurus in greatnumbers. At different junctures in the development of Sikhism, one finds

allusions to the depressed situation of its followers. Social criticism runs

throughout the scriptures and is one of the cornerstones of Sikh religion,

which is why the use of the name haicould possibly be seen as fittinginto the sociopolitical dimension of religious thought as outlined in the

Adi Granth.

28 In the same fashion, it seems, Sur Das used the epithet hai. See John Stratton Haw-ley, Sur Das: Poet, Singer, Saint(Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1984).

29 Mann (n. 18 above), p. 13.


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Miri-Pirias interpretive gridrecasting Dhadias a socialand performative category

There is not much doubt that the Sikh Gurus had bards (hais, bhas,and other musicians) among their followers. Sikh iconography, for in-stance, depicts Guru Nanak with two disciples, one of whom is Mardana,

the player of the one-stringed instrument, the rabab.30Drawing on Per-sian chronicles, Joep Bor and Daniel Neuman proposed that the name

haisignifies a particular group of local musicians who, during Mughalrule, were ranked as average musicians below other musicians of Persian

origin, such as the atai or huzuriand gunijan or darbari.31Thus, by usingthe epithet hai, the Sikh gurus employed a distinct social category asan idiom of self-reference. While this fact seems uncontested, the ques-

tion of what actual social role the bards held is somewhat ambiguous.Before, I have indicated the mystical evocation of the name hai. In

the literature I refer to in this section, we find numerous references to

hais as heroic singers. Thus, Joep Bor quotes from the chronicler Fa-quirullah, arguing that dhadhis [hais] were the oldest community ofmusicians, and originally Rajputs. They sang karkha, which was com-

posed in four to eight lines to sing the praises of the war-lords, the brave

soldiers, and to narrate the affairs of battles and war. He also informs us

that the Punjabi dhadhis [hais] played the dhadh [ha] (a small-sizeddhol to which they owed their name), and sang heroic ballads, called bar

[var].32 This seventeenth-century description ofhaibards is astonish-ingly close to the image of contemporary Sikh hais. Interestingly, inthis citation we find generic associations with narrative-musical forms

such as the var, which in turn is one of the most frequent poetic metersused in theAdi Granth. As a matter of fact, the reference to haiin theSikh scriptures occurs in the form ofpauris. This is the term used forshort compositions that are either a subsection of avaror take the form

30 This group of Muslim performers still exists in Panjab (particularly in Lahore), andthey trace their origin to the same Mardana who is said to have accompanied Nanak on hislegendary travels. While the rabab was an instrument used in Sikh kirtan singing, the samecannot be said of those instruments (saragiand ha) that are characteristic of the haigenre in contemporary Panjab. Thus, although we find in the early Sikh tradition a combi-nation of stringed and percussion instruments (sarinda andjori-pakhawaj) that might haveconceptually facilitated later uses of folk instruments, instrumentation alone is not sufficientto account for the meaning of hai in the Sikh tradition.

31 Joep Bor, The Voice of the Sarangi, Quarterly Journal of the National Centre forthe Performing Arts 15 (1987): 6178; Daniel M. Neuman, The Life of Music in North

India (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1980). See also Bonnie C. Wade, Imaging

Sound: An Ethnomusicological Study of Music, Art, and Culture in Mughal India (Chicagoand London: University of Chicago Press, 1998).

32 Bor, p. 62.


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of a single short var. The genre of the var(pl. varam) is usually trans-lated as epic poetry. The twenty-two varam and abundant pauris in-cluded in the Adi Granth vary in their musical structure, but some of

them are attributed to bards who were specialists in heroic genres.33 GuruArjan specified nine varam, with particular information on rhythm andstyle.34 Significantly, these varam are associated today with the haigenre.

For the Sikh tradition, the occurrence of a heroic varin theAdi Granthreflects what is often described as a transition from a pietistic to a heroic

period in Sikh history. In its application in modern historical analysis, the

distinction between these two phases sometimes involves the idea of a

dualistic devotional concept in Sikhism. Yet it must be clearly stated that

for a majority of Sikh believers piety is not opposed to the concept of theheroic. Most people would agree, however, that because of historical cir-

cumstances, a martial spirit and militant resistance as ultimate forms of

self-defense became an important facet of Sikh religion. And with this

new political emphasis, I shall argue, we also find that a new form of re-

ligious aesthetics is introduced into Sikhism. The notion of haiservesas an ideal point of access to reflect on the social and political signifi-

cance attributed to this transition.

The turning point was Guru Arjans death in 1606, which is remem-

bered as the first martyrdom in Sikh history. This event was followed bydecisive changes in the Sikh tradition, introduced by Guru Arjans son

and successor, Guru Hargobind (15951644). The latter founded the in-

stitution of the Akal Takht (the eternal throne), hence the representation

of Sikh political authority. It was erected exactly opposite the sacred

place of worship, the Harmandir Sahib, in Amritsar. Guru Hargobind es-

tablished a strong military force, wore the paraphernalia of royal power

(he was called the sacca patah, the true king), and established a royaldarbarfrom which he issued his orders, or hukumname.35This apparent

mimesis of prevalent symbolic and political forms of royal authority led

33 According to research on this topic presented in the Sikh Encyclopedia, the varachievednew status with Guru Arjan: The Gurus from the time of Guru Arjan onward had Bhasand bards in attendance on them. After Satta andBalvan, whose varwas given scripturalstatus by Guru Arjan, we come across bards Abdullah and Natth Mall who sang vars in thetime of Guru Hargobind. They are believed to have written 72 vars, though only a few frag-ments of these are still extant. Guru Gobind Singh had living with him a large number ofpoets and bards, prominent among themMir MushkiandMir Chhabila who recited vars atthe afternoon divans. See Harbans Singh, ed., The Encyclopaedia of Sikhism (Patiala:Punjabi University, 1998), 4:407.

34 These include Var Malak Murid tatha Cahndrahara Sohia, Rai KamaldiMaujdikiVar,Tune Asraje kiVar, Sikandar Birahim kiVar, Lalla Bahilima kiVar, Var Jodhe ViraiPur-baniKi, Var RaiMahime Hasne Ki, Rane Kailas ate Maldeo kiVar, Muse kiVar.

35 G. S. Chhabra, Advanced History of the Punjab, vol. 1, Guru and Post-Guru PeriodUpto Ranjit Singh (Jalandhar: Sharanjit, 1960), p. 196. See also Uberoi (n. 18 above), p. 93.


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to a situation in which Sikhs were perceived as a potential threat to the

legitimacy of the Mughal state.

In a nineteenth-century hagiographic genre, the Gurbilas Patshahi6, it

is mentioned that Guru Hargobind patronized haibards; two of themare explicitly namedAbdullah and Nattha.36 The patronage of musi-

cians fits into a larger cultural picture. The transmission of Mughal re-

ligious and political authority, for instance, drew heavily from cultural

performances and rituals in which hai and other musicians partici-pated. It is most likely that Guru Hargobind followed this pattern by call-

ing haimusicians into his darbar. According to Sikh hagiographies,this happened at the time when he established his military force.37

Thus, Sikh hagiography links the emergence of haibards with the

militarization of the community. The majority of contemporary Sikhhais name Guru Hargobind as the founding patron of their community.Guru Hargobind not only introduced military exercises, he also created

the Sikh ideal of the saint-soldier (sant-sipahi) that can be traced back tothese historical circumstances. According to this narrative, hais wereintroduced to provide panegyrizing services on the side of Sikh worldly

power. Their contribution was to sing martial ballads to inspire the mili-

tary followers of the religious leader. This transition in the organization

of the Sikh community is conceptualized in the principle ofmiri-piri: the

balance held between spiritual and temporal power.38 As a consequenceof the execution of his father, Guru Hargobind wore two swords that

symbolized the dual structure of worldly and spiritual power. The haigenre, linked to the ceremonial order of the Akal Takht, hence became

part of the miriconcept and must therefore be considered as an agent ofreligious-political power. Until the present day, hais are associatedwith the Akal Takht and perform in the same vicinity. In other places,

they are explicitly introduced as the heroic element to be distinguished

from the congregational kirtan. The narration of historical deeds and the

eulogies of heroic deaths on battlefields have become in this way the dis-tinctive edge of haiperformance in the Sikh tradition.

36 Chhabra, p. 200.37 A further possible interpretation could be that, in order to build military strength, Guru

Hargobind exploited the martial nature of the tribal Jas who brought with them the he-roic tunes of the hai tradition. This is a valuable idea insofar asJas are known to havevenerated martyr-saints and to have inherited a heroic tradition. Yet we have to be very care-ful not to essentialize heroism and violence at the level of tribal identity. See, e.g., Nonica

Datta, Forming an Identity: A Social History of the Jats (Delhi: Oxford University Press,1999).

38 For a discussion of the miri-piri system, see Bachittar Singh, Akal TakhtConceptof Miri-Piri, in Current Thoughts on Sikhism, ed. Kharak Singh (Chandigarh: Institute ofSikh Studies, 1996), pp. 21647.


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Rasa and sikh religious aesthetics

I have referred to the nine varam in the Adi Granth that are associatedwith the hai genre. The narrative content of these hymns confirmstheir emphasis on heroic aesthetics. The maujdikivar, for example, tellsof two rivals at Akbars darbarwho die on the battlefield. The mood ofthese varam is bir-rasa, the musical form that according to the Indianrasa theory corresponds to and evokes a heroic taste or mood. It

is important to note that these hymns constitute gurbani (the authenti-cated language of the Sikh Gurus) and are thus given voice in Sikh kir-

tan. Accordingly, the mood of bir-rasa is conceptualized as a part of themystical orientation of calling Gods name, sometimes referred to as namrasa. The first transition in the concept of haiaesthetics therefore has

to do with a shift within the framework of Sikh sacred language. It is nota question of one form ofhaibeing linked to sacred language and theother to secular discourse.39

Before discussing further the historical transitions of the haigenreand its reevaluation in contemporary religious discourse, let me briefly

turn to the notion ofrasa, which I have found to be a popular concept of

aesthetic receptivity in Panjab. I do not want to engage here in a theo-

logical or philosophical debate on whether the concept of rasa accounts

for the mystical experience in liturgical ritual or not. What I have observed

is that listeners and performers do employ the technical language of ra-

sas in order to draw distinctions between genres of public performance

and ritual liturgy to the extent that these are efficacious in creating par-

ticular, collectively shared moods. The mastery of various performative

genres and the refinements of voice are seen as prerequisite to generating

and experiencing these moods.

The early Sanskrit treatises on dramaturgy and aesthetic experience

in which the notion of the rasa is delineated link technical mastery and

religious experience, while placing each of them on different planes.40

Thus the evocation of aesthetic pleasure is not considered an end in it-self, in the sense of taking pleasure in art for the sake of art. On the con-

trary, aesthetic experience is seen as a generalized emotive situation created

by means of dramatic, poetic, or musical performance, which ideally is

39 While in the Islamic tradition we find strong emphasis placed on the tajwid, the in-herited tradition that prescribes in minute detail how precisely the Quran is to be recited,a similar institution is missing in the case of Sikh religion. For a discussion of aesthetics inthe Islamic tradition, see Navid Kermani, Gott ist schn: Das sthetische Erleben des Koran(Mnchen: Beck).

40 Wulff (n. 11 above), p. 674. The theory of Indian aesthetics was presumably first de-veloped in a treatise on Sanskrit drama (Nayashastra) attributed to the sage Bharata andfurther explored by the Kashmiri Shivaite philosopher Abhinavagupta (tenth to eleventhcentury). For a translation, see Raniero Gnoli, The Aesthetic Experience According to Abhi-navagupta (Rome: Instituto Italiano per il Medio ed Estremo Oriente, 1956).


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oriented toward a process of revelation. The experience of rasa is not a

natural state of feelings and sentiments expressed on the stage, but a

culturally stipulated concept for which, in the case of classical drama,

several requirements of actors and listeners are posited.41 Sanskrit dramatheory is explicit in describing the various techniques to be used by

actors on the stage to produce seven to nine different types of rasa, such

as anta (the pure state of mind, what is thought to be the Buddhas stateof mind) or vira (the heroic state). But listeners, too, have to be familiarwith the various representational forms and underlying emotive states of

mind that are thought to resonate in the process of dramaturgy.

With regard to the religious and cultural traditions of South Asia, rasa

is differently assessed as a concept by which to understand the commu-

nicative and experiential processes in liturgical ritual and performativecontexts. Such differentiations also apply within one and the same reli-

gious tradition. Thus, contemporary hai performance differs signifi-cantly from the framing of musical performance and reception in terms

of sacred liturgy, in the way demonstrated above. The emphasis contin-

ues to be placed on the heroic mood (bir rasa), engendered through theperformance of varand saka tunes. Rasa as a modality of performativeaesthetics, however, becomes related to rhetorical forms of voice produc-

tion in oratory and song, which serve purposes other than those expressed

in Sikh kirtan.I shall provide as an example a section from a popular composition

from the early 1930s in which the eighteenth-century Sikh warrior and

martyr Baba Dip Singh is praised. The section consists of oratory thatleads to a popular haisong in the Panjabi vernacular. Baba Dip Singh,by that time the leader (jatthedar) of a Sikh misl (military squad), re-ceives the news of an attack by the Afghan ruler Abdali on Amritsar. His

reaction is represented as follows:

41 Gnoli, pp. 6364. In the translation of Abhinavagupta, aesthetic receptiveness is equi-valent to a mirror-like power of intuition (pratibhara) that resides in the heart.

[oratory]

[When the Sikhs heard this, they got

enraged. Everyone was ready to be

martyred. They held their swords ready

for attack. Before they moved out,

Baba Dip Singh drew a line on theearth and once again challenged his

companions:

prasaga

Ih sun ke sheram de dil bharak uhe. iktom duja pahilam shahidi prapt karanwaste tiar si. sabh talwaram puh ketiar ho gae. turan tom pahilam babadip singh ne dharti te lik vic khic ke ikvar pher lalkar ke kiha:


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42

The rhetoric of martyrdom and bloodshed predominates in contemporary

haiperformance. The efficacy ofhaiperformance is conceptualizedin terms of bodily heat (the blood is brought to a boilkhun vic jopaida

hai ) or the eruption of inner forces (man andar ubal auna). The body im-age of the Sikh hai bard is apparently different from the meditativeposture of the kirtan singer and listener: the performers stand upright and

hardly move their bodies during the performance, while keeping a ma-

jestic and noble pose with the eyes fixed in one direction. In addition

to the musical-poetical forms, haiperformances are assessed in termsof facial expression, gesture, and bodily movement. The entire bodily dy-

namic consists of the raised oratory finger and the alteration of the sing-

ers voices. Thus, although the bards do not use a very complex grammar

of facial expressions and meaningful gestures, they are certainly engagedin a manner in which the movement of the hand, the modes of voice pro-

duction, the play of gestures, and the symbolic meanings displayed by

the body in terms of dress and pose constitute recognizable performative

aesthetics that depend on their visibility rather than their audibility.

For the Sikh disciple, rasa as linked to the notion of ineffable mystical

experience in Sikh kirtan is therefore not equivalent to the aesthetic con-

cepts and representative contents of contemporary haiperformance. Interms of a technical grammar to assess standards of technical mastery and

42 I traced this composition to Sohan Singh Seetals Sital Taragam (Ludhiana: LahoreBook Shop, 1993). In my doctoral dissertation I have devoted several chapters to analyzingthe transitions and entailments of the genre in pre- and postpartition politics in the Panjab.See Nijhawan, Dhadi Darbar (n. 1 above).

Saka

lik mar ke dip singh khanha

lishkawem

bole: agge lik tom uh suraawem

jis num maut kabul hai, dil nahimulawem

purza ka mare nahim kanwikhawem

mare tegham siddhiam sidhe muhkhawem

holi khee khun di Sital rang lawem

[Tune Saka]

[Drawing a line, Dip Singh raised his

sword

He said: Only he should cross this

line, who

embraces death, and whose heart

would not be feeble

Who would cut the enemy in pieces,

and would not show his back,

Who would attack them with swordswhen facing their eyes,

Who would play holi with blood, says

Sital.]42


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ritual or performative competence, however, the orientation toward rasa

as a discernible object alludes to a shared framework of aesthetic evalu-

ation. It is because of this shared framework that actors are able to revi-

talize links between the musical-aesthetic domains of haiand kirtan.

Dhadias heroic spirit: refashioning the puranic tradition

Sikh performers today face further interpretive problems, as hai aes-thetics are often associated with particular categories of social and reli-

gious difference.43 Most of the references that are historically available

in Sikh hagiography trace hai musicians with Muslim names. If weturn to colonial representations, we find that hai performers wereglossed in derogatory terms as mirasi. Although this category originally

represented a group of genealogists cum musicians, its social usage hadbeen expanded to designate a witty and vulgar character. Whereas for the

Sikh gurus the social class and religious background of the Muslim mu-

sicians was not problematic, it seems that in a contemporary context the

Sikh tradition faces some difficulties in bridging the two dissonant mem-

ories of the haigenre. On the one hand, it is remembered as an intrinsicpart of the Sikh devotional tradition, and yet, on the other hand, we have

a suppressed memory of folk singers who were patronized and had

their origin in different cultural or even different religious traditions. One

might assume that these two perspectives are not mutually exclusive, andindeed I have no intention of questioning the social legitimacy of this

claim. But the puzzle remains of how we ought to understand the transi-

tion from a devotional employment of the name haias an intrinsic partof Sikh sacred literature to a performative genre based on secular rep-

resentational modesa transition that entails a shift from aesthetic to so-

cial categories as well as a shift from what is considered sacred language

to vernacular representational modes. Further interpretive efforts are nec-

essary to frame the genre as cultural practice and as an agent of Sikh

collective mobilization in historical perspective. In the following sectionI propose that this transition be assessed in terms of an integration of dif-

ferent religio-aesthetic concepts, as can be inferred from the discourses

and practices that have centered on another revered text in the Sikh tra-

dition, theDasam Granth.

Like almost every other religion, Sikhism comprises different traditions

and schools of thought, some of which are regarded as almost heretical

43 Nijhawan, Dhadi Darbar, chap. 1. There are indications for a historical connection

with Muslim as well as Hindu traditions. Yet the associations with Islam clearly outweighsuch references. For the linkage of the name haiwith bhakti religion, see also CharlotteVaudeville, Leaves from the Desert: The Dhola-Maru-Ra Dhuhaan Ancient Ballad ofRajasthan, in herMyths, Saints and Legends in Medieval India, ed. Vasudha Dalmia (Delhi:Oxford University Press, pp. 273334.


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by the representative institutions of the Sikhs. The Nirmala and Nira-

karisects, for instance, are known to revere living saints and to worshipicons. Their disagreement with Khalsa Sikhs has repeatedly led to ten-

sions within the Sikh community. Some traditions, however, are veryclosely associated with the martial tradition of Sikhism, which is why the

veneration of Guru Gobind Singh and Sikh martyrs such as Baba DipSingh acquires a special place. To one such tradition, the Nihag Sikhs,I shall now briefly turn to show how the discourse on hai is linked toa particular inheritance of heroic aesthetics in Sikhism.Nihag Sikhs wereoriginally known asAkaliNihag, a heavily armed order within the Sikhpanth that can be traced to Guru Gobind Singh. In the following, I con-

centrate on a conversation that I had with Prem Singh, a contemporary

Nihag Sikh, who by the time we met was teaching the gurbaniclassesat the Sikh Missionary College in Anandpur Sahib. Prem Singhs account

of the origin of the hai genre is interesting for at least two reasons:First, he knows the Sikh scriptures by heart and is particularly committed

to seeing haias an intrinsic part of the Sikh martial tradition as linkedto the tenth guru; and second, he shows how epic literature that is in-

cluded in theDasam Granth is assigned an authoritative voice.

TheDasam Granth (literally, the tenth book) is a compilation of hagio-

graphic and epic texts attributed to Guru Gobind Singh. Besides compo-

sitions such as theAkal Ustad, Jap, and Zafarnama, which are regardedas authentic (i.e., believed to be Gobind Singhs own or authorized

words), the great majority of verses are martial epics and folk renderings

of ancient Puranic (Hindu) texts such as the Devi-Mahatmaya in theMarkandeya Purana. Titled ChaniCaritra or Krishnavtar, we find thecosmic battles of the Hindu goddess Durga depicted in epic narratives.According to the Sikh reformist tradition, the tenth guru presumably

named the Dasam Granth a book of diversion, to be clearly separated

from the status of theAdi Granth. This point seems convincing insofar as

there is an unambiguous absence of spiritual reverence or pious attitudetoward the goddess Durga in theDasam Granth. Yet, as Nikki-GuninderKaur Singh argued, we find significant evidence that as a mythological

figure the Hindu goddess is a crucial element in Guru Gobind Singhs

religio-aesthetic world view.44 Indeed, we can assume that she is reincor-

porated into Sikhism as a kind of archetypal figure representing the aes-

thetic imagery and mood of the heroic, which at the time of Gobind

Singhs endeavor to fight a holy war (dharam yuddh) against the Mughal

rulers must have appealed directly to his followers. It is also likely that

44 Nikky-Guninder Kaur Singh, The Feminine Principle in the Sikh Vision of the Tran-scendent(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), p. 123.

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the poetic power of the Durga myths was relevant for the Khalsa brother-hoods military struggles in the eighteenth century.45

Among the possible reasons for evoking the mythic power of Durga as

a female principle in Sikhism, Singh cites the untamed female energyand sacrificial ethos attributed to Durga as creator and destroyer, the fullindependence of her character, and her purifying anger. Not only is the

evocation of these heroic features expressed in abundant epic narratives,

but the erotic flavor, the heroic mood (the martial, or raudra) constitutes

the dominant rasa of poetry honoring Durga.46 This brings us back toour interest in religious aesthetics, and indeed it seems to me that the

high reverence paid to the Dasam Granth within the Khalsa tradition isdue to the fact that it offers a key to understanding the particular heroic

aesthetic values and ideals held by the last of the historic gurus. Thisholds true for the contemporary reverence paid to the Dasam Granth

within segments of the Khalsa tradition. As the next section shall dem-onstrate, the meaning of the haigenre becomes associated with theseheroic aesthetics.

For Prem Singh, theDasam Granth has by no means lost its appeal at

the end of the twentieth century. When my colleague Khushwant and I

first met Prem Singh at his home in Anandpur Sahib, the latter was quick

to point to heroic poems he had himself written, and which for him

were related to poetry in theDasam Granth. Responding to our questionson the origins of the haigenre in the Sikh tradition, he did not beginhis account with Guru Nanak but instead with a reference to one of the

poetic verses in the Dasam Granth in which the mythological origin of

haiis conceptualized as the singer of the kharka var. Sikh haibardsare often remembered as the singers of this particular poetic form. The

word kharak is onomatopoeic in denoting a breaking, cracking, explo-

sive, or rattling sound. The word is often used as a metaphor for an inner

state of agony and pain. In this fashion it shares an important facet of

poetry in theDasam Granth, particularly in theBisnupaas, where ono-matopoeic forms are frequent in the depiction of battle scenes.47

45 Louis Fenech assumes that for the tradition of martyrdom in the Khalsa the over-whelming majority of famous eighteenth-century Sikh martyrs drew their inspiration fromboth the character and hymns of this altruistic, saintly warrior [Guru Gobind Singh, M.N.].Sikhs of this period joined the Khalsa and were willing to undergo, and succeeded inundergoing, various privations including death to institute the tenth Gurus idea of righ-teousness. See Louis E. Fenech, Playing the Game of Love: The Sikh Tradition of Mar-tyrdom (doctoral thesis, University of Toronto, 1994), p. 86.

46 Singh, The Feminine Principle, p. 124.47 The Dasam Granth offers a vast repository of poetic meters that still have not been

sufficiently analyzed and recognized as valuable sources by linguists and historians of thePanjab. Generally speaking, both syllables (varnik) and syllabic instants (matrik) were used,


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The epic to which Prem Singh refers must be read as a creation myth:

the origin of hai is accounted for, and other social categories such asthe bhas or the sayyids and sheikhs originate here. The scene is taken

from the Chani Caritra (405) and describes a cosmic battle betweenMahakal (the creator and destroyer of the universe, eternal time) and thetwo demons Suaswiray and Dirhgadar. The Caritra consists mostly ofthe battles between the goddess (Cani or Durga) and various demons.Each of these battles represents the cosmic clashes between the forces of

evil and good. It is in this particular story that the goddess, bearing the

name Dulhadevi, expresses her wish to marry Mahakal. She is called onby the latter to besiege the two demons as a proof of her devotion. While

she is fighting, the goddesss skills impress Mahakal. He joins her and

kills one of the demons, Suaswiray. The battle with Dirhgadar demandsmore effort, as the demon is portrayed as withholding the attack. Sweat

from Mahakals forehead drops on the earth.48 From these drops Bha-acarya was created, the founder of the lineage of the bhas. Accordingto Prem Singhs account, from the latters sweat, hasen then came intoexistence, hence the first haisinger. He in turn gave birth to Bhumsenwho finally intervened in the battle to kill the demon. After hasen wasborn, he sang a heroic song during this battle, which aroused the war-

riors spiritsthe above-mentioned kharka var. This is mentioned as a

decisive factor in winning the battle against the forces of evil.Prem Singh insists that Guru Gobind Singh did not confuse this Ma-

hakal with the Hindu-Gods, but instills an idea that is superior to Kar-tikayi (in Hindu tradition considered the son of Shiva-Parvati). In hisopinion, the myth itself cannot be regarded as the authentic voice of the

48 The idea that these figures are born from the sweat of the fighting goddess clearly res-onates with the idea of asuras in Hindu mythology. The asuras are demons that are bornout of blood-semen (rakt-bij). As A. K. Ramanujan has pointed out, many Indian oral epicsand related narrative traditions can be understood as folk renderings of the ancient Puranas

in which the epic heroes, gods, goddesses, and demons are reincorporated as bodies thatsweat, stink, defecate, and menstruate. It seems that such an emphasis on bodily mattersis placed here as well. A. K. Ramanujan, On Folk Mythologies and Folk Puranas, in Pu-rana Perennis: Reciprocity and Transformation in Hindu and Jaina Texts, ed. Wendy Doni-ger (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993), p. 103.

but also meters that are specifically related with the haigenre, such as the baimt. On therelationship between meters and narrative meaning, the Sikh Encyclopaedia says, In the

Dasam Granth the battle scenes have been described through the metres Kabitt, Savaiyya,Padhistaka and Bisnupada. Saviyya hitherto had been generally used for sensuous lovepoetry, but Guru Gobind Singh used it with consummate artistry for heroic poetry. To cap-ture the sounds as well as the swift movements on the battlefield, he has used small metreslike Padhistaka. Metres are changed frequently with a view to describing different types ofcombat. In this process the similes and metaphors are sometimes relegated to the backgroundbut where similes and metaphors dominate, the metres remain mostly unchanged (HarbansSingh, ed., [n. 33 above], p. 518).


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guru (maulik bani), but as a new and exhilarating interpretation of thePuranas (purana ullkhda kita hoia grantha da) by Guru Gobind Singhin the sense of a powerful mythic narrative of war. In this regard Prem

Singh articulates a current interpretation according to which GobindSingh included mythological accounts of cosmic battles in the Dasam

Granth in order to stir the fervent passions of his followers to resist the

Mughal army. According to this line of interpretation, the renderings of

the Puranic sources are not to be interpreted as a religious discourse that

would entail the veneration of the Hindu gods.

Prem Singhs account of the origins of hai, therefore, has to be in-terpreted on two different planes of analysis. On the one hand, it articu-

lates the dominant interpretive frameworks according to which Sikh

literature is to be divided into authentic religious and interpretative-historical sources. In its position within Hindu religious cosmology, haiis thus made other; it is part of the Puranic tradition, which is not con-

sidered part of the Sikh belief system. By means of clearly distinguishing

between the authentic sacred literature of the Sikhs and these renderings

of Puranic epics, the Sikh tradition is able to account for the Puranas as

historical sources even if they are not acknowledged in their entire cos-

mological dimension. This observation can be summarized by Surjit Singh

Hanss statement that theDasam Granth is not a work of Sikhism per se

but a Sikh textbook on received tradition.49

On the other hand, haiis reincorporated as a part of a particular aes-thetic tradition into Sikhism. And it is reincorporated in a fashion in which

the voice ofhaiis being imbued with an agentive quality: the particu-lar sounds and aural rhythms attributed to the original haibard are de-cisive for the victory of the goddess over the demons. We can see this in

the link between the inciting quality of voice and the religio-aesthetic

disposition it evokesagain based on a reinterpretation of the emotional

concept of the rasas. Guninder Kaur Singh has nicely captured the vari-

ous poetic devices used in the Dasam Granth to create the heroic mood(here raudra rasa instead of vir rasa). It will quote from her book atsome length in order to show how the concept of the haivoice has tobe read in terms of the particular aural aesthetics of the Dasam Granth:

It seems as if Guru Gobind Singh had woven raudra rasa into the warp andwoof of the language itself, into the very texture of the words! His frequent use

of alliteration, assonance, and consonance lends a stimulating rhythm and mu-

sic to the narrative. The constant repetition of sounds like bha, gha, jha, ha,

and ra reproduces the heavy sounds of combat. In durga sabhe saghare ra-khakharag lai, . . . for instance the use of bha, gha, and ra makes the versethrob with excitement. The sound itself suggests that the goddess is felling the

49 Surjit Hans, Ramavtar in Dasamgranth,Journal of Sikh Studies 11, no. 1 (1984): 62.


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giant-like demons. In another verse, bhaka bhuk bherihah uh akam . . .hakahukkhalam, the martial rhythm is ringingly audible. The readers be-come saturated with the frenzy of battle and are carried away with it, feeling it

flow turbulently in their own blood and nerves. In another line, tani tani tir calaedurga dhanukh lai the sound alonea combination of the alliteration of tandthe consonances of laireproduces the speed of action in actual fighting.Durgais pictured here shooting arrows (tir calae) with all her might (tani tani ). Thesedevices are very appropriate to the description of battle-scenes. Another favor-

ite device is the use of onomatopoeia. Guru Gobind Singh subtly chooses wordswhose sound suggests their meaning. He reinforces raudra rasa by the aural

effect of his diction. The different names used for Durga like Cani , Bhavani,andDurgshah have a heroic ring. Furthermore, polysyllabic words or compoundepithetsaurally very resonantenrich the poetry. . . . In such instances a multi-

plicity of characteristics are brought together, heightening both sound and sense.50

This emphasis on the aural aesthetics of the poetry in theDasam Granth

provides an explanatory framework for Prem Singhs evocation of the

haivoice as the arbiter of the heroic spirit. Prem Singh is aware of thefact that the gurus (beginning with Guru Hargobind) patronized the haipoet-bards and that this corresponded to the historical transition of the

Sikh community. The reemphasis on the heroic dimension of hai onthe side of the miriconcept in Prem Singhs account thus involves a tran-

sition in religio-aesthetic meanings as well as a transition in agentive-psychological disposition. Born from the sweat of the fighting Mahakal,the haias the primordial singer of the kharka varis the authentic voiceof the cosmic battle. In our conversation, Prem Singh confirmed the view

that hais are patronized to bring the blood in the Sikh bodies into rage(varam ga ke sikham andar joate jitt de sankalap num hor pekar karderahe). As the one to incite a particular aesthetic quality, the haihas be-come reified as an agent in Sikh history.

concluding remarks

In this exploration of the haigenre in the Sikh tradition I have tried tofind an explanation for the transitions in Sikh religious aesthetics under

different sociopolitical constellations in Panjab. Although contemporary

performers frame the hai genre in terms of pious conduct, Sikh dis-courses continue to allocate a notion of otherness to it, to the extent that

it is seen as part of a mythological tradition outside the spiritual world of

Sikh religion. The transition from the evaluation ofhaias part of Sikhsacred language to its recasting in terms of patronage and bardic perfor-

mance has been partially the result of the historical developments takingplace during earlier periods of Sikh history. Yet, as the major interpre-

tative move to bridge both perspectives in contemporary perspective, I

50 Singh, The Feminine Principle, p. 138.

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have identified the suspension of social references to the name haibysimultaneously revitalizing ontological meanings such as the sacredness

of sounds and the heroic aesthetics inherited in performative genres.

The persistence of the haigenre as a form through which to articu-late a pious Sikh self has been due to the influence of core traditions

within the Sikh fold, which have assigned agency to the religio-aesthetic

forms associated with hairepresentational practice. The martial tradi-tion in Sikhism in particular has emphasized that the heroic meaning of

hai is linked to particular figures of the martial epic tradition, whichfinds its primary text in a broader field of Puranic literature and localized

practices of the veneration of martyred spirits. The framing ofhaiaes-thetics in terms of a martial image and heroic tunes is of paramount im-

portance for the interpretation of the agency ofhaibards in the contextof crisis and violence that could be witnessed during the militant move-

ment in the 1980s.

Almost two decades after the movement ebbed, Sikh performers pro-

vide alternatives to deal with the dissonant memory in the haigenre. Ihave referred to Pawandeep Kaurs rendering ofhaiin terms of a dia-lectic between tension and release. In a somewhat different but related

way, another performer, Inderjit Singh, has recently phrased his ideas in

one of our conversations as follows:

haiis like a golden vessel (ikk sone da bhanda). While the vessel is made ofgold, it remains upon you what you put into it. You might put juice, Coke or

Seven-up in it. That is your choice. The hai tradition (hai kala) is thisvessel, this pot. What some people make to resonate (sunana) in it, that is com-pletely their business. . . . In one direction, people delved in the sweet taste of

the folksong (lok git), in the other direction, it was Guru Nanak who providedthe unique amritin singing the devotional songs.

Here, we find the idea that hai is a cultural form to be filled with re-ligious or secular content. Similar to Prem Singhs interpretation, InderjitSingh recognizes that the Sikh gurus were reflexively drawing on a shared

repertoire of oral culture. But unlike in Prem Singhs discourse, the allu-

sion to Guru Nanak places an emphasis on the phenomenology of musi-

cal-poetical form as a vehicle through which mystical elixir (amrit) can

become manifest. I would therefore argue that the assignment of reli-

gious meaning to a performative genre is due to shifting discursive con-

structions and historical interpretations, as I have demonstrated in this

article. But, more than that, such resignifications are the result of reeval-uations of religious musicality and aesthetics and, most intriguing, a

move toward a revitalization of the mystical dimension of the Sikh haigenre.

H id lb U i it

Divine Bliss to Ardent Passion

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