Guru Nanak’s mission

Nanak was born on April 15, 1469. His father, Mehta Kalian Das Bedi, was an accountant in the village. Talwandi Rai Bhoe, now named Nankana ...

Nanak was born on April 15, 1469. His father, Mehta Kalian Das Bedi, was an accountant in the village. Talwandi Rai Bhoe, now named Nankana Sahib, about forty miles from Lahore. It is likely that Nanak, like his elder sister, Nanaki, was born in the home of his mother, Tripta, and like her, named after his maternal home, Nanake.

Nanak was a precocious child; at the age of five he started asking questions about the purpose of life. At seven he was sent to a pandit to learns the alphabet and numerals, and two years later to a Muslim mullah to learn Persian and Arabic. He took little interest in his studies and began to spend his time discoursing with holy men or in solitude, ‘without confiding the secrets of his heart in any one’.

At the age of twelve he was married to Sulakhni, the daughter of Mool Chand Chona of Batala. Even the marriage did not turn his mind towards mundane matters, ‘‘He began to do worldly tasks, but his heart was never in them; he took no interest in his home. His family complained: ‘These days he wanders out with the fakirs.’’’

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Nanak was nineteen when his wife came to live with him. For some time she succeeded in turning his attention to herself and two sons were born to them.

Then Nanak’s mind went back to spiritual problems and he again sought the company of wandering hermits for guidance. His father tried his best to get him to tend his cattle or to set up as a tradesman, but it was of no avail. His sister brought him over to her home in Sultanpur, and through her husband’s influence got him a job as an accountant.

At Sultanpur a Muslim minstrel, Mardana, joined Nanak and the two began to organised the singing of hymns in the town. The janamsakhi describes their life in Sultanpur: ‘‘Every night they sang hymns … They fed everyone who came … An hour and a quarter before sunrise he would go to the river to bathe, by daylight he would be in the durbar doing his work.’’

During one of these early morning ablutions by the river, Nanak had his first mystic experience. The janamasakhi describes it as communion with God, who gave him a cup of amrit (nectar) to drink and charged him with his mission.

Excerpted from ‘A History of the Sikhs’ Vol 1

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