Talk:Guru Nanak Dev/Archive 1

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From December 2005 to July 2006

Contents

Dev

Hi, I was thinking about something. Why add the word 'Dev'? Guru Nanak was not a god. Isn't that an Insult to Sikhs?

--Street Scholar 18:09, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

Erm, no it's definately not an insult to Sikhs. It's the form used by many Sikhs even though they believe none of the Gurus were gods. I can't explain why Dev is used, but it's the common way to refer to Guru Nanak's full name. However, as ever, more information on the origin of the name would be appreciated. Sukh | ਸੁਖ | Talk 18:34, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
I don't really agree with you, I think it should be edited out. From what I understand only Hindus who don't believe in monotheism use this title, i.e the Punjabi Hindus. Only Ignorant Sikhs would use this word. --Street_Scholar 20:29, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
Dev is not just used to mean a God. For example, Tagore was just a writer but was known as GuruDev. also i dont think monotheism is thr right word for sikhi, rather monism. what does everyone sle think?--Balvinder 23:19, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
No, I disagree :D Do a Google search for "Guru Nanak Dev" and see just how many prominent Sikh sites use it. Sukh | ਸੁਖ | Talk 20:51, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
Sorry my bangrah dancing friend, but a majority opinion is not always a factual opinion. Maybe we can get some people to vote on this? --Street Scholar 20:55, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
I'm a bhangra dancer now? :/ And yes, in many cases such as this, majority opinion does rule. Guru Angad Dev's real name was Lehna, so why not rename him too? Ah, because most people call him Guru Angad Dev... :D Sukh | ਸੁਖ | Talk 21:53, 13 December 2005 (UTC)
Sikhs do the Bngrah right? you're a Sikh? if not I do apologize. Mate this is an encyclopedia, not a biography-page. I don't see the point in adding 'Dev' its not part of Guru Nanak's name. If you don't remove this I'll do it myself the next time I have a look at this article. and I also note the word 'ji' this is not acceptable for an encyclopedia article. Also the other Guru's who have the same titles need to be edited. --Street Scholar 14:26, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
urm hi. i dont know if you were trying to be nasty or if you are just misinformed. if you think bhangra is something 'sikh' you are terribly misinformed. do you then think it is wise for you to be editing this article?--Balvinder 23:17, 3 May 2006 (UTC)
Yes I'm a Sikh, but it doesn't mean I do Bhangra. 'Guru Nanak Dev' was his name - whether you like what Dev means or not. In regards to 'Ji' I agree with you. In the body of the article there really shouldn't be 'Ji' or 'Sri' or 'Shaheed' or anything of the sort - feel free to remove them. Many articles are littered with it, so feel free to remove them. Sukh | ਸੁਖ | Talk 15:13, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
Oh you don't do the Bhangra? I know of many Jatt Sikhs who do the Bhangra. OK I'll try to fix up the article and edit out the 3 words you listed. However I'll leave the word 'Dev' if you insist.--Street Scholar 16:11, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
Okay - the rest of the Sikh Guru pages need the same treatment. Also, the 'Sri' and 'Ji' bit in the Punjabi translation also needs removing. Sri Chand is a special case. He is always known as Sri Chand, not simply 'Chand'. Sukh | ਸੁਖ | Talk 16:38, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
OK, you can do the Punjabi pages, my Punjabi sucks. --Street Scholar 19:30, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

I changed the Birthdate of the Guru Nanak from the 20 Oct 1469 to 15 April 1469 as per: http://www.sikhs.org/guru1.htm But I have some doubts about this because the 5th Guru, Guru Arjan Dev seems to be also born on the 15th April 1563. Can anyone clarify which is true? JG

How many other articles list the date you have changed it to? --Street Scholar 13:44, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

NPOV tag

this article seems to take the perspective of the life of Guru Nanak, rather than a neutral, encyclopaedic perspective. Sentences such as "never did he ask anyone to follow him" sound like they've been taken out of a brochure promoting Guru Nanak. the idea here is to share knowledge instead of promoting a certain perspective.

I am removing your NPOV tag. Just because one is not a native speaker of English does not make a statement biased. "Never did he ask anyone to follow him" is easy to rewite as "Guru Nanak never asked anyone to follow him". Neither statement is POV unless you have evidence that he recruited followers. — 12.74.168.214 21:09, 17 December 2005 (UTC)


I agree with initial poster. I have fixed the POV. 12.74.168.214, you need to bring the proof, I certainly can't find any.--Street Scholar 15:40, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Contradiction in the article....

Well, how can Guru Nanak say: "there is no Muslim or Hindu" and then later say: "Muslims should be true Muslims, and Hindus should be true Hindus" I am removing both the comments as this is a contradiction, unless if someone can bring some evidence to the alleged remarks Guru Nanak made.--Street Scholar 15:45, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

Well the first comment is definately well known and attributed to Guru Nanak ([1] [2] [3] [4] - Google has hundreds of pages). Not so sure about the second though, so I've left that out for the time being. And, the two statements are not necessarily contradictory - the first statement is basically saying "All of humanity is one in the eyes of God", it does not mean that there were no Hindus or Muslims. Sukh | ਸੁਖ | Talk 16:54, 19 December 2005 (UTC)
I can only remarks that a great many scholars of Sikhism speak to Nanak's desire for Muslims to be true Muslims and Hindus to be true Hindus. A few on-line comments to that effect:
If you want cites from the Adi Granth to support these statements; for the Muslim see pages 140 and 141; for Hindu see page 6; among a great many others. I will repeat, if you have any evidence that Guru Nanak recruited disciples, please cite it. —12.74.169.16 05:06, 20 December 2005 (UTC)
If we were to remove all apparent contradictions in reference to religion, I suspect we'd have to burn all the texts of all the world's religions. It seems to me hasty to edit such things without very good reason. Fearwig 19:47, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Pilgimages

If he was opposed to pilgimages, why did he go to perfrom pilgrimages himself ? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 80.1.224.12 (talk • contribs) .

Response by MAX314: Man, I hate it when people don't use the common sense that Guru Nanak so desperately tried to get people to use. You're bang on the money, my man. Guru Nanak [i]never[/i] performed pilgrimages and he never endorsed them. What Guru Nanak did was search for answers by walking through the world and assessing how different people lead their lives. His teachings were reactionary to what he was seeing. This ain't a 'pilgrimage'.

P.S. - I would really like more non-Sikhs to analyse and criticise the way Sikhs practice Sikhism. I think we need that outside view because I think that Sikhs have just replaced old rituals with new ones and are effectively doing the things that Guru Nanak orignally thought were unrewarding practices. Do you know what happened in those three days he went into the water? He meditated. And meditated. And meditated. And you know what he realised? It's all rubbish. Yes, there is a God. No, we'll never understand what s/he really is. But what we CAN do is live a fruitful and REAL life with dignitity and morals and family and community. That's ALL Sikhism is. Common sense. What does 'Sikh' mean? It doesn't take the name of any prophet or any man or any philosophy...other than the philosophy that we learn for the entire duration of our lives and should EMBRACE it instead of closing our minds to it.

Phew...just had to get that off my chest.

--

WARNING: User 24.81.188.120 is attempting to "Hindu-fy" the Wikipedia pages related to Sikhism and the Sikh Gurus, by subtly changing (adding, deleting, modifying) words to amplify Hindu elements while minimizing other elements (e.g. the fact that Guru Nanak was born in what is now present day Pakistan). If you don't believe me, look at the changes he's implemented under Sikhism, under history of edits. I suggest a careful audit, since MANY pages have been modified.

Serious editing need

this page reads like a brochure. come on guys, we can do better than this.

i'm going to make an effort to make this a properly informed article.--Balvinder 23:22, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

hi. just started on tthe changes. so far i have cleared it out and put in more cohesive sections. please only put in detailed information, not opinion or lecturing, there is now a seperate placxe for POVs at the bottom of the article--Balvinder 00:01, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

note about images

the picture was removed. if you want to put up an image please state that it is an artists impression, the artists name and the date/ear of the painting.

here some suggestions ofr better images: 1. early sikh art 2. photographs of historical sites

--Balvinder 00:01, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

NPOV Banner & Rewrite

I've added a NPOV banner and moved Balvinder's edits to Talk:Guru Nanak Dev/Rewrite. Thanks. Sukh | ਸੁਖ | Talk 23:26, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Guru

Its not proper style to use guru in the title. Just the name alone will be fine. -Ste|vertigo 03:24, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

You are right, Guru word should not be used in the title but should be used in the description so that no one in future gives him the title of God or Lord. This was the foundation of the Sikh religion and intended by its Gurus. Whereas, adding Ji at the end of the name is a Hindu way of being overly respectful slave mentality, it should e discontinued. [Inder-May2006]

Interesting but not impressive

Guru Nanak was born during the high renaissance time when a number of amazing people were born all over the world and contributed brilliant new ideas to the humanity, some of them are DaVinci, Michaelangelo and Galileo to name a few. When you compare all those amazing personalities with Guru Nanak then you ask a question... what were Guru Nanak's contributions to humanity... not very impressive...[Inder -May 2006]

This article is a poor look at Guru Nanak's life. Read a book about his life; then maybe you will understand how he ranks up there with people who have contributed greatly to humanity. He is greatly revered by Sikhs, Hindus, and Muslims alike on the Indian subcontinent. Sukh | ਸੁਖ | Talk 14:31, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

I have read and heard a lot about Guru Nanak and still find his contributions un-impressive. Guru Nanak is known to have stood against the Brahmin domination and started a following that led to creation of the Sikh religion by the last guru, Guru Gobind. Interestingly, Guru Nanak was a peaceful person whereas Guru Gobind had to rise to the occasion of aggression by muslims. Islam being the dominant religion of the time, Guru Nanak traveled to several parts of the middle east for the sole purpose of curiousity and learning. I think it is enlightening to understand high renaissance time to better understand Guru Nanak and see what other people had really contributed to the humanity. One needs to be open minded rather than mass follower. [Inder-May 2006]

Just want to clear something up...

Someone left me a comment on my talk page saying I was belittling Guru Nanak, which I found upsetting. Firstly I never belittled Guru Nanak, I mean why would I do that when I have created some articles on Sikhism in good faith? I think some of my comments on here were taken the wrong why my some Sikh, where I said about the contradiction. The reason why I said this was if true Guru Nanak said: "there is no Muslim and no Hindu" then how can he later say "A Muslim should be a good Muslims and Hindu should be a good Hindu?" I am not getting funny here, but that clearly is a contradiction. Hence why I believe, this maybe a problem in the interpretation of what actually Guru Nanak said, or he never said that.

The point I am trying to make is don't go based on hearsay, the information could be wrong. So anyway I do apologize if I had offended any Sikhs. I'm a Jatt myself and sometimes, when I speak it just comes off as arrogant so I do apologize to all the Sikh brothers I may have offended with my comments. --Street Scholar 13:04, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Okay, let me explain these two apparent contradictions. The reason you think they may be contradictions is that you are lumping them together and taking them without context (i.e. as simple statements with only a literal meaning).
"One of Sikhism's claims is that it is not a syncretic religion 3 (i.e., created by the merger of two religions, in this case, Hindu and Islam), but that it is its own new creation and new idea that has simply adopted some Hindu and Muslim concepts. This issue was actually addressed during the first moments of Sikhism's life, in Guru Nanak's words "There is no Hindu, there is no Muslim." Nanak's search for the True values and Reality had been instigated because he began to see less and less Truth in humankind. Specifically, Nanak began to see deterioration and exploitation in the Hindu and Islam religions. His statement therefore, pertained to the fact that Nanak saw no people who were True Hindus or True Muslims because they were blocked from the truth by their corruption. 4 The new faith, as commanded by God, would spread the ideas of searching for the True love and reality in this world, which had been perverted by their culture. "Sikh" actually means "learner" or "disciple," adhering to Nanak's call." - [5]
Now, you can see how his statement of being a Good Hindu/Muslim does not contradict his original statement. Sukh | ਸੁਖ | Talk 21:02, 19 June 2006 (UTC)


Yes, I understand now. I think that should be noted in the article it would make alot more sense. I should be noted that Guru Nanak Ji is saying this in a metaphorical sense. --Street Scholar 14:13, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Street Scholar, feel free to shoot me a message if you do not understand something. It may be better to get a second pair of eyes to look at it rather than making suggestions despite not understanding the topic.  :) Sukh has done a good job in helping you understand better but I would like to reduce the clutter on the discussion page, if possible. Thanks. --hardeep 21:34, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

guru nanak

All the debate of where he was leading to, well firstly , he was preaching the love of god. Thats it. The story of when he dissapeared into the waters, i think was a 'metaphor' . He was a curious human like all humans on earth. He just stumbled on a faith which would make the world a better place. His words and statements have been misinterpreted dramatically, thats why the Sikhs nowadays claim Hindus and Muslims are ' blinded'.He was a human being but a preacher of god, should he be named a saint? Why should the sihs bow down tho the 'HOLY BOOk' when the teachings were from a muslim poet and a hindu priest.Its all a form of respect to Guru Nanaks last wishes.Why in any marriage , the couple must make rounds the Holy Book? As Guru Nanak said"why must i wear a sacred thread when god is in my heart." Then why Treat the book as sacred? Why not pray like the Muslims and Devote like Hindus. I greatly respect Guru Nanak for his journey and his visions for the world in a ' modern era'. Has his teachings taken another path? The 5 'k's is it really neccesary in todays day and age? All religion preach to love god and help others to love god. I guess the channel has diverted such as 'Sikhism today' into proving that which religion is 'realistic' and which are blind.-- 04:20, 11 July 2006 (UTC)Raj

When, "Guru Nanak spoke out against empty religious rituals, pilgrimages, the caste system" how come Sikhism too have many a rituals and caste system that divide Punjabis to Jats, Khatri, Balmiki, Bhatra etc. Is that then Sikhs are not being true Sikhs in the view of Guru Nanak who had chided Hindus and Muslims for not being true Hindus and Muslims respectively?

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