Abraham Eraly - The Age of Wrath - A History of the Delhi Sultanate

When I was born, the world smiled and I cried.

But I will do such deeds that when I die,

I will be smiling and the world will be crying.

The main thrust of Kabir’s mission was to unite Hindus and Muslims in a common quest for god realisation. ‘Hindus and Muslims have the same god,’ he held. ‘God is the breath of all breath … Look within your heart, for there you will find [god] … All men and women in the world are his living forms.’ Although many of his sayings had a strong Hindu flavour in them — presumably because of Ramananda’s influence — he made no distinction between Hinduism and Islam. Similarly, though he usually referred to god as Hari or Rama, he used those words as synonyms of god, and not as the names of particular deities. ‘I am not Hindu nor Muslim; Allah-Ram is the breath of my body,’ he stated, and went on to declare that

Kabir made no distinction between religions or castes. ‘In the beginning there was no Turk, no Hindu, no race, no caste,’ he maintained. Not surprisingly, he ridiculed many of the common Hindu beliefs and practices, such as the caste system, idol worship, belief in divine incarnations, the practice of going on pilgrimages, and so on. ‘If by worshipping stones one can find god, I shall worship a mountain,’ he mocked. He considered many of the conventional socio-religious customs and practices of all religions as utterly ludicrous. ‘A Brahmin wears a sacred thread he himself has made. If you are a Brahmin, born of a Brahmin mother, why haven’t you come into the world in some special way?’ he taunted. ‘If you are a Turk, born of a Turk, why weren’t you circumcised in the womb of your mother? If you milk a black cow and a white cow, can you distinguish the milk that they give?’

Kabir’s emphasis was on inward devotion, not on outward displays of faith. And he exhorted:

Kabir’s disciples — Kabir-panthis — came from both Hindu and Muslim communities, but on his death they split into two sects, one of Hindus and the other of Muslims, each claiming that Kabir belonged to their religion. And they wrangled with each other about the funeral rites they should perform for him. But when, according to legend, they removed the sheet supposedly covering his body, all they found there was a heap of flowers. His Muslim and Hindu followers then divided the flowers between them, and performed over each lot their particular funeral rites. Subsequently even the Hindu followers of Kabir split into two groups, the Bap (father) sect, and the Mai (mother) sect. The Kabir-panthis are generally considered a Hindu sect.

Hinduism in medieval times was a very different religion from what it was in Vedic times, having metamorphosed twice over a period of two thousand years, first into Upanishadic Hinduism around the middle of the first millennium BCE, a thousand years after Aryans brought the religion with them into India, and then into Puranic Hinduism yet another thousand years later, around the middle of the first millennium CE. These transformations of Hinduism however were not due to any external influence, but due to its own evolutionary process, as in the case of Upanishadic Hinduism, or due to its assimilation of numerous tribal cults over the centuries, as in the case of Puranic Hinduism. [15] For Upanishadic Hinduism, see Gem in the Lotus , Part III; for Puranic Hinduism, see The First Spring , Part XII.

These evolutionary processes in Hinduism ended well before the Turkish invasion of India, and there were no radical, transformative new developments in the religion during the medieval period. The late classical period was the age of mystics in Hinduism, around whom several new cults had formed, many of which endured well into the medieval period. A few new mystic cults also appeared in Hinduism in medieval times. But far more fascinating than all this was the appearance of a few syncretic religious cults in India at this time, some of which had significant insights into the human predicament. But they all remained peripheral movements, and did not bring about any notable or enduring changes in Hindu religion or society.

An important development in Hinduism in the late classical period was the formation of monasteries, mathas , evidently in simulation of Buddhist monasteries. In time some of these monasteries grew enormously in wealth, power and influence, and their chiefs took to surrounding themselves with quasi-royal paraphernalia, holding court under ceremonial umbrellas, and touring around on elephants, accompanied by drummers and followed by large entourages.

But these were superficial changes, changes in appearance, not in substance, and they involved only a tiny fraction of the Hindu population, and had virtually no effect on the religious culture of the common people, which remained the same as it had been for several centuries. The approach of the common people to religion in Hindu society was rather casual, unlike the fervent earnestness of the devotees of monotheistic religions, like Christianity and Islam. Hindus, notes al-Biruni, are ‘so little pious, that, when speaking of these things (religious matters), they do not even abstain from silly and unbecoming language.’

Hindus were devout in religion, but not fanatical. The main reason for this was the presence of countless gods in Hinduism, unlike in all the other major religions of the world. This multiplicity of gods in turn led to the existence of a great diversity of sects, rituals and beliefs in Hinduism. And this sectarian diversity in turn led to the practice of broad religious tolerance by Hindus. Though there were a few instances of clashes between rival Hindu sects, they by and large coexisted companionably. Nor was it uncommon for the devotees of one Hindu deity to also offer devotions to other Hindu deities, or even to the deities of other religions. Hindus, unlike Christians and Muslims, were not monomaniacal about their faith. Hinduism has no heresies, as any deviant belief and practice could be accommodated and legitimised in it.

Despite all this diversity there were a few universally held beliefs among Hindus. One such belief was in metempsychosis. This was noted by several medieval chroniclers. ‘Metempsychosis is the shibboleth of the Hindu religion,’ comments al-Biruni. This faith ‘is rooted in their hearts, and about which they have not the slightest doubt,’ adds Abu Zaid, a tenth century Iraqi chronicler. Life, Hindus held, does not begin with birth. Or end with death. Birth and death are only transformative phases of the eternal cycle of life that a being goes through, in which one could be reborn in any socio-cultural environment, or even as any creature, depending on one’s karma.

FACTUAL, OBJECTIVE INFORMATION about medieval Hinduism is scanty, though there are some interesting sidelights on it in the reports of foreign travellers and scholars. The religious beliefs of medieval Hindus, according to al-Biruni, were similar to those of ancient Greeks: ‘The heathen Greeks, before the rise of Christianity, held much the same opinions as Hindus; their educated classes thought much the same as those of Hindus; their common people held the same idolatrous views as those of Hindus.’

Belief in omens was universal in medieval India, and was often trivial and absurd in its expressions. In Kerala, according to Barbosa, ‘if a cat crosses in front of any person who is about to do any business, he does it not; or if on going from the house for any purpose they see a crow carrying a stick, they turn back; or if while saying farewell to other persons with whom they have been, one of them sneezes, he who was going sits down and does not leave soon.’