guru

DIWAN KHANA GURUDWARA, LAHORE:This Gurdwara is situated near Chuni Mandi chowk, close to the birth place of Guru Ram Das ji. The Guru\'s ancestors belonged to Lahore. At the time of the marriage of one the sons his elder brother, Sahari Mal, the Guru asked his son (Guru) Arjan Dev to attend the cere money, as he himself was unable to attend the same.

FIVE KHANDS or Panj Khands, lit. realms (panj == five, khand == region or realm), signifies in the Sikh tradition the five stages of spiritual progress leading man to the Ultimate Truth. The supporting text is a fragment from Guru Nanak`s Japu, stanzas 34 to 37. The Five Realms enumerated therein are dharam khand, the realm of righteous action (pauri 34), gian khand, the realm of knowledge (pauri 35), saram khand, the realm of spiritual endeavour (pauri 36), karam khand, the realm of grace, and sach khand the realm of Truth (pauri 37).

GANJ NAMAH (Treasure Book), by Bhai Nand Lal Goya, is a panegyric in Persian, partly verse and partly prose, in honour of the Ten Gurus. Bhai Nand Lal was a revered Sikh of the time of Guru Gobind Singh and a distinguished poet. The Ganj Namah renders homage to the Gurus whom the poet recalls in terms of deep personal devotion and veneration. The opening eleven couplets are an invocation to the Guru who raises men to the level of gods (3), to whom all gods and goddesses are slaves (4), and without whom there is only darkness in the world (5).

GHULAL, an old village in Ludhiana district, 8 km west of Samrala (30°50`N, 76°ll`E), claims a historical shrine dedicated to Guru Gobind Singh. This Gurdwara is not included in older lists of Sikh historical shrines, but local tradition indicates that Guru Gobind Singh, on his way from Machhivara to the interior ofMalva country, stopped in this village for a while before proceeding to Lall. The Gurdwara stands on a mound inside the village said to be the site of an older shrine.

GOINDVAL (31°22`N, 75"9`E), the first ever place of Sikh pilgrimage so designated by its founder, Guru Amar Das. This in fact was the spot where the ancient eastwest highway crossed the River Beas. With the renovation of the highway by Sher Shall Sur, the Afghan ruler of north India (1540-45), this ferry site became an important transit point. This led one Goinda or Gonda, a Marvaha Khatri trader, to plan establishing an habitation at the western end of the ferry. Thwarted in his endeavour by natural calamities which Goinda attributed to evil spirits, he repaired to Khadur to seek Guru Angad`s blessing.

GRANTHI, from the Sanskrit granthika (a relaier or narrator), is a person who reads the granih, Sanskrit grantha (composition, treatise, book, text). The terms are derived from the Sanskrit grath which means "to fasten, tie or string together, to compose (a literary work)." In Sikh usage, granih refers especially to the Guru Granth Sahib, the Scripture, and the term granihl is used for the officiant whose main duty it is to read the Holy Book in public. The granth`i`s, the principal religious official of Sikhism, but should not be thought of as a "priest" in the usual sense.

GURBAKHSH, an Udasi saint contemporary with Guru Gobind Singh (1666-1708), who was at the time of the evacuation of Anandpur directed by the Guru to stay behind to look after the local sangat and the sacred shrines. Years later, when Gulab Rai, a great grandson of Guru Hargobind (1595-1644), occupied the seat where Guru Gobind Singh used to hold assembly and, pretending to be Guru, started accepting offerings from Sikh devotees, Gurbakhsh remonstrated with him and finding him adamant and unrepcntcnt cursed him with an early death, with no progeny to continue his line. Gulab Rai soon died childless and it was the descendants of his brother, Shyam Singh, who flourished in Anandpur.

GURMANTRA, Punjabi Gurmantar, is that esoteric formula or term significant of the Supreme Being or the deity which the master or teacher confides to the neophyte to meditate on when initiating him into his spiritual discipline. The concept of mantra goes back to the pre-Vedic non Aryan tradition and to the primitive cults of magic, animism and to temism. It has since been a continuing element one way or another in the religious traditions of the world and traces of it pervade to this day among the most modern of them. The occultist and the tantrist believe that mantras have power over the deity and can make it confer the desired boon or favour.

GURU KA LAHORE, a town in Bilaspur district of Himachal Pradesh, 12 km north of Anandpur Sahib associated with the matrimony of Guru Gobind Singh. In 1673 Bhai Hari Jas, a Subhikkhl Khatri of Lahore, had while on a visit to Anandpur betrothed his daughter Jito to him and had desired that the marriage party should come to Lahore where the marriage would be performed with due dignity. But the fateful events leading to the martyrdom of Guru Tegh Bahadur intervened, and in the changed circumstances it was not possible for the young Guru to go to Lahore.

GAUTAMA Indra seeing Ahalya, the wife of ascetic Gautama was allured. But (with the curse of Gautama) he had a thousand disgraceful marks on his body; then he repented in his mind. (Prabhati M. l, pp. 1343-44) Because of the punishment of a thousand disgraceful marks, Indra wept..... (Var RamkaU M. 3, Shalok M. l, p. 953) The wife of Gautama, who was tumed into a stone, •was liberated. (Gond Namdev, p. 874) It is recorded in Ramayana that Indra was guilty of the seduction of his Guru Gautama\'s wife Ahalya. He visited the Guru\'s house during his absence and assumed the form of Gautama. Ahalya suspected that it could not be her husband, who had gone to take a bath in the early hours of the morning.