Content
The immortal One is for Guru Gobind Singh sometimes the 'wholly Other,' far above human comprehension, before whom man can but bow again and again. As the succeeding waves of negative attributes roll on one may well wonder how there can be any communication with this inscrutable Being. The answer is, of course, that He of his grace has offered companionship to man, so that man does not have to understand, but only to accept and adore. Sikhism offers a new path of salvation in addition to the traditional paths of knowledge, work and devotion - the path of the Name, Naam. Meditation on the Name produces Wismad, wonder; and the object of such poetry as the Japp Sahib is the creation of the mood of aesthetic ecstasy: Sher Singh in the Philosophy of Sikhism writes: "It is the poetry and the music of the contents of the Granth revealing simple and direct truths which charm a reader of Gurbani...and can bring peace to the soul." "It is the aesthetical insight leading man through appearance to reality." Meditation on the Name is fundamental to Sikhism, and so in this opening hymn of the Dasam Granth, men are given a thousand names on which to meditate.
Read more about this topic: Jaap Sahib
Famous quotes containing the word content:
“A rake is a composition of all the lowest, most ignoble, degrading, and shameful vices; they all conspire to disgrace his character, and to ruin his fortune; while wine and the pox content which shall soonest and most effectually destroy his constitution.”
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)
“Let us have a fair field! This is all we ask, and we will be content with nothing less. The finger of evolution, which touches everything, is laid tenderly upon women. They have on their side all the elements of progress, and its spirit stirs within them. They are fighting, not for themselves alone, but for the future of humanity. Let them have a fair field!”
—Tennessee Claflin (1846–1923)
“I were content to wearie out my paine,
To bee Narsissus so she were a spring
To drowne in hir those woes my heart do wring:
And more I wish transformed to remaine:
That whilest I thus in pleasures lappe did lye,
I might refresh desire, which else would die.”
—Thomas Lodge (1558?–1625)