Jasbir Singh Ahluwalia

The quest for the nectar (amrit) bestowing grace and immortality upon the seeker has been one of the recurring, perennial motifs of the Indian mind. This quest was realized twice; once in mythology and second time in history.

The opposition between good and evil is of an ever-going, never ceasing, permanent nature; in modern idiom this connotates that the dialectic of good and bad, the rational and the irrational, is embedded in the very nature of reality.

Whenever there occurs the preponderance of the evil over the good, the Divine, according to traditional Indian philosophy, descends into the world as an Avtar to revamp and rejuvenate the forces of piety and justice; mankind looks up to an 'external' source to salvage the situation as an act of Divine intervention.

A new stage in the development of Indian philosophical thought and spiritual ethos arrives with the realization of the nectar in 'history' on the Baisakhi day of the year 1699 at the hands of Guru Gobind Singh who imparted a new quality to baptismal amrit that infused a new spirit into the mind of a recipient; the irresistible will to do the righteous action even at the cost of one's life. This new amrit bestowed immortality, not in the sense of self-perpetuation, but as self-transformation into a new order of spiritual life (Sach Khand) and social reality (Dharam Khand).

Baptismal amrit is not a ritual in that its five symbols - Kakkars - are not supposed to possess any magical potency latent in the form. On the other hand, baptismal initiation is of the nature of a sacrament whereby the recipient of amrit undergoes an inner change in holy communion with the Divine; his regeneration symbolizes the resurrection of the first Five Beloved ones who took amrit after offering their heads to the Guru. The five kakkars are the insignia of this communion which is indicated by the expression; "Waheguru ji ka khalsa". As such, through the amrit an inner force - spirit - was instilled into man, into society, to internally and autonomously resolve the ever-going contradiction between the good and the evil.

This, in other words, means that the Divine Spirit became self-conscious in Society. This was a new, unprecedented, revolutionary idea in the history of world civilization. Much later in the 19th century, German philosopher, Hegel, gave the idea that the Transcendent Spirit becomes alive on sociological level in and through the modern State that he identified with the Prussian military State. This Hegelian idea lead to the concept of State absolutism and authoritarianism represented by the Nazi Reich. In orthodox Marxian garb, this view resulted in the self-claim of the Communist Party to be the embodiment of the Historical Spirit and hence the exclusive source of political power and ideological wisdom.

On the other hand, the concept of the Divine Spirit becoming self-conscious in the Order of the Khalsa flowered out in the democratic republicanism of the Sikh Misls; here the Order of the Khalsa refers not to a self-limiting sect but to a self-expanding open-minded sociological category of peoplehood. Thus the notion of political sovereignty vesting neither in the king as his divine right, nor in any vice-deity like the Christian Pope or Muslim Khalifa, nor in the State, nor in the Party, but in society, brought humanity to the threshold of modern value-pattern in which 'We the people' - an expression as used in the Preamble to Indian Constitution....are the rightful repository of all power, including the internal self-regenerating power in the struggle of the good and the evil, the just and the unjust.

Such is the theological and political significance of baptismal amrit bestowed by Guru Gobind Singh on humanity. It's sociological significance in the new value-pattern is even more significant.

Traditional Brahminical society was based on the notion of predetermined, fixed hierarchy as the normative principle of social organization; the caste system was the expression of this principle of fixity. Brahmanical society permitted upward movement of the lower sections into the higher levels through a cultural process named sanskritzation by M.N. Srinivas; a lower group of caste, having circumstantially acquired wealth or power, would be admitted into the higher structures of the caste-bound society only after giving up its original identity, and emulating and adopting the caste denominations and behavior patterns of the higher castes.

A lower caste was not conceded any sanctity or legitimacy in its own right and in its own self-identity, even if it had gained power and pelf. For instance in the South the shudra rulers had to assume the kshatriya status after undergoing a symbolic rebirth through the ceremony of the golden cow; this was considered essential for getting political legitimacy as well as social responsibility. Simulation and imitation of the ethos, manners and rituals of the higher group by the status seeking lower group was considered necessary. This process of sanskritization made room for upward movement of lower sections, while reinforcing the fixed hierarchy of the system.

Revolting against the idea of fixed hierarchy as the normative principle of social organization, Guru Nanak, in his egalitarian mission, rejected what later came to be described as the sanskritization process for upward movement and respectability at the higher levels of society:

The lowest of the low castes
The lowliest of the lowly, I seek their kinship
Why emulate the (so-called) higher ones
Thy elevating Grace is
Where the down-trodden are looked after. (SGGS, p.15)

On the same wavelength says Sant Ravi Dass that he who is most pious is Shudra: Ravidas jau at pvit hai, soi Shudra jan.

Here was a new revolutionary approach that provided social equality, moral sanctity, political legitimacy, and vertical mobility for the lower castes and sections of society in their own right and with their own self-identity.

It was this approach that was socialized by Guru Gobind Singh through the baptismal ceremony of amrit, thereby providing a new sociological principle channel and process of vertical movement of the lower strata in society - a new kind of vertical mobility that, ipso facto, involves an ongoing process of restructuration of non-hierarchical, open society on the basis of equality. Nawab Jassa Singh, who attained to the highest politico-military leadership of the Sikhs in the eighteenth century, continued to be known as kalal in self-glorification of his low caste identity. This in a sense, symbolizes the new value-system institutionalized by Guru Gobind Singh through the sacrament of amrit. Unfortunately, the ceremony of amrit is being taken by some as a ritual and not as a sacrament, while its sociological significance is little realized even by the learned ones.