Concept of God in Sikhism- Part I

Concept of God in Sikhism
 --By Sujan Singh ji

Humans have always been anxious to know who created this entire universe, who controls it and who created all the living beings. The ancient man thought that some  super power is there above us who controls all his creation. That super power in ancient Hindu scriptures, Upanishads, was named as Om or Braham. Later, the concept of soul originated probably on the basis of some evidence provided by some persons who remembered their past lives.

In  Upanishads, soul is described as indestructible and with the death of a person, the body, the physical being, is either cremated or buried but the soul, the ethereal self, takes another birth. The concept of God then changed and was considered as supreme soul governing all the souls in the living beings.

God was named as Parmatma, the supreme soul and all the souls in humans as a part of that supreme soul. Later, it was theorised by ancient scholars that the souls take birth in human form according to their deeds or karma in their past lives. A human, after his or her death, may take birth again in human incarnation or may take birth in any of the 840,000 creations on the basis of his or her good or bad deeds. It was also theorised that a human’s soul merges with the supreme soul of God if he purifies his soul through good deeds in his human life and does not commit any sin. Later, with the advancement in knowledge, the concept of God continued to change.

According to Hindu philosophy

According to Hindu philosophy, concept of trinity God, Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh, originated. Lord Brahma gives births to all living beings depending upon their good or bad deeds. Lord Vishnu gives sustenance to all the living beings in this universe again on the basis of good or bad deeds committed in their previous births. Lord Vishnu thus controls the entire material, Lord Mahesha takes away lives from all the living beings and is thus called the destroyer.

The kings who were cruel and committed sins were called demons and those kings who were kind to the public and who defeated and killed demons were considered as reincarnation of Lord Vishnu and are worshipped as prophets by Hindus. In all ten prophets are recognized in Hindu religion. These are Kachh, Machh, Warrah, Narsinha, Vaman, Purshuram, Lord Rama, Lord Krishna, Mahatma Buddha and Kalki. The last one, Kalki, is still to manifest.

In other religions also, God has different names and prophets are sent by God to eradicate evil from this world.

In Christianity

In Christianity, God is named as God. Jesus is the last prophet in Christianity and is considered as the beloved son of God.

In Islam

In Islam, God is named as Allah.Similarly, Hazart Mohammed is the last prophet in Islam.

No one has defined God in any religion though every religion describes various qualities of God.

Guru Nanak Dev JI for the first time defined God as Ikoankar or Ekamkar and explained this in his Bani at various places in Guru Granth Saheb Ji.

Ikoankar or Ekamkar is composed of three words I.e. Ik, Oank or Om and Kaar. Each of these three words describes God and His existence in this universe.

Concept of God before creation of Universe

Concept of God before creation of Universe In Sikhism God is conceived in two forms i.e. in Nirguna form and in sarguna form..‘Ik’ (meaning one) in Ikoankar defines Nirguna state of God. It is that state of God when He had not created the universe as yet. He was one and the only one at that time. He was in himself. There was no universe, no suns, no planets, no satellites, no living or non-living creatures, no good or bad deeds, no light, no days or nights. In fact there was total darkness at that time.

God had not created in Himself His own powers, including the power of creation and the power of destruction.  He was thus devoid of any characteristics or any qualities. He was one and only one.

The ancient Hindu books describe this period of darkness, when God was one and only one, extending to 36 yugas (one yug is variously described as 1000 years, 10, 000 years or even more).

Once, Guru Nanak Dev Ji was asked by learned saints (Sidhas) to describe the ‘Nirguna’ state of God. Guru Nanak Dev Ji replied that ‘Nirguna’ state of God is a divine wonder. A man is too little a creature to even think of that state, let alone to describe that state. When God Himself had not acquired His power of creation, how can a created one, the human, think of that state of God? Everyone and everything is created by God. How can a created one think of the state of a creator when there was nothingness, no creation, only the creator. He, the creator, only knew about Himself of that state. Strangely enough, science, also explains the state of universe prior to Big Bang in more or less a similar way.“ What existed prior to this event is completely unknown and is a matter of pure speculation.

About 15 billion years ago, the entirety of our Universe was compressed into the confine of an atomic nucleus. All the matter and energy of space was contained at one point. Known as a singularity, this is the moment before creation when space and time did not exist. According to the prevailing cosmological models that explain our universe, an ineffable explosion, trillions of degrees in temperature in any measurement scale that was infinitely dense, created not only fundamental subatomic particles and thus matter and energy but also space and time itself”(world website, Google, Canada). According to Guru Nanak Dev Ji, all creations were into God when God was in Nirguna state. 

Tenth guru of Sikhs, Guru Gobind Singh Ji also said that when God attained creative powers, He created the entire universe, the living and non-living, the planets and suns, the galaxies and thus the universe. But when at any moment, God would like to destroy His creation; all created would go into Him.

To Be Continued...

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